


Charm

by orphan_account, whiskeyandspite



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Magic, Masturbation, Orgasm Delay/Denial, Teasing, UST, a shitton of fluff, a tower of magical books, and... Winston, character death (neither of the mains), fairytale AU, subtle mind control
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-28
Updated: 2013-08-25
Packaged: 2017-12-21 14:53:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 52,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/901588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account, https://archiveofourown.org/users/whiskeyandspite/pseuds/whiskeyandspite
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>We all have two lives. The second begins when you realize you only have one.</i>
</p><p>Prince William, controlled by the evil queen who also happens to be his obsessive stepmother, seeks the help of a foreign Duke to save the kingdom all the while falling desperately in love.</p><p>There is magic. There is fluff. There are enchanted books that vie for attention and horses that swim, and foxfires in the swamp and near-death experiences. And, of course, a happy ever after.</p><p>A prompt by the wonderful <a href="http://haanigram.tumblr.com/">haanigram</a> on Tumblr. We love you bb, you are a star.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is a complete fic set, 5 chapters, that will be posted weekly on a Sunday. Through practice and time, we've adjusted our style from [Nice Work If You Can Get It](http://archiveofourown.org/works/867983) to read a little easier than the jumpy double-perspective. I hope it helps, we love getting feedback from you guys and your support is overwhelming!
> 
> Also... the evil Queen is Freddie. Don't look at us like that, you know it works.
> 
> Quote is, yes, from Tom Hiddleston from the Nerd HQ at this year's Comic Con, but it's pertinent to the story. Trust me.

  
_We all have two lives. The second begins when you realize you only have one._

-

Will accepts another glass of wine and knocks it back faster than it takes the servant to walk past him fully. He deposits the now-empty glass on the same tray, in the same place, and moves further into the crowd. Anything to avoid the Queen – his mother in no sense of the word beyond title – and her retinue, all excited for the arrival of their guest of honor.

Yet another suitor. Yet another failure in the works.

Will has long since grown cynical of love and its false promises. Love did not save his mother from dying in childbirth, giving him life and offering hers instead. Love did not save his father from plague, as his stepmother watched and mourned, eyes far too expressive for someone numb with grief. Love is nothing but a word that tastes foul in his mouth, and being at a ball in celebration of a new marriage makes it taste all the fouler.

He hadn’t always hated his stepmother. For years he looked up to her, emulated her strength and grace, but after the death of his father, something changed in her. She grew more powerful and proud, skin brighter, hair longer, eyes blue and piercing instead of warm and gentle. And she fixed Will with her gaze frequently, as though deciding if he were worthy of a gift he was certain he never wanted to receive. 

Now they rarely spoke, save in anger, and Will found himself unable to sleep the closer time drew to his twenty-fifth birthday. Plagued by nightmares and inexplicable panic, the eyes watching him more closely than they ever had before; keeping him in her sight at all times, claiming protection. Will knew better, though what he knew, he couldn’t voice.

The night grows older and the wine flows freer, and Will is certain the suitor will arrive to a hall of imbeciles, none coherent enough to even bow. But then the doors open and the music ceases, and Will lowers his glass as the man enters, immaculate and proper, taller than Will by a head at least, and in the nauseating familiarity of the faces in the hall packed together in false joviality, absolutely stunning.

The man of honor is from far away, foreign by all aspects. His dress is unusual, but worn well and flattering, his features are darker by a little than is the norm. Perhaps he is not handsome entirely, but he carries himself well and the features are unusual enough to be thoroughly striking. The murmur in the hall does not quite stop - the wine has flowed too freely, and their guest is fashionably late. He is also, unquestionably, the man they are waiting for. 

He isn't a Prince, William recalls, his title is Grand Duke of somewhere unpleasant sounding. It amounts to an expansion for both kingdoms, if this engagement too is not ultimately called off by the Queen. His stepmother is beautiful, and fickle when it suits her agenda. Expansionism is on her mind, of late, lands and titles - and it amuses her to think she will be Grand Duchess as well as Queen, though she suggests that the union is a step in the right direction for the kingdom.

But perhaps, given the way his stepmother settles onto the man's arm - Will reaches for another glass and bitterly eyes the lack of arrayed prospects in his age group - she finds him far more alluring than she expected. Her red ringlets are arrayed beautifully around her face, her dress cut low to draw the eye and please her vanity. She was pretty enough to afford a vast measure of the latter, even for her age. There's magic behind it of course, but there are rumors enough about her suitor that Will supposes even should he drop the information that his stepmother would soon be three hundred, the man won't be surprised. 

Or perhaps he will. William knows little enough about where he came from - as much part of his sheltering as his stifling. The Duke accepts the Queen's fawning with grace, but his eyes stay cool, observant. He is not taken in by what's dangled in front of him, as if he prefers to earn what he intends to have. His eyes pass over Will who stays amongst the fray, forcing his stepmother to come to him instead of being fully polite, and feigns interest in the speculative conversation of some of the Queen's court ladies.

"And never been married? I imagined someone... younger," seems to be the general murmur amongst fiercely jealous women, all occasionally fluttering their fans to obscure the shapes their mouths made, as if that could render their words inaudible as well as invisible.

"William," his stepmother has the uncanny ability to sneak up on him, and when he turns he is affixed with the surprisingly warm attention of the Grand Duke, a real smile. "You didn't come say hello to Duke Hannibal."

Will refrains from retorting, from pointing out that the Queen rarely wants William to ‘interfere’ with her private business, public as this spectacle is. He instead offers a smile in return, a cold, thin one aimed at the Queen, and one that warms by a degree when he turns to the Duke. He brings a hand to his chest and bows, as is customary, before returning to stand. He has always been told to be humble, to be a Prince of the people, but one who knows them. When his father was alive, it was easier. Of late, even leaving his chambers without watchful eyes on him has been a challenge.

“My lord Duke,” he’s not sure what else to say, small talk has never been a strong suit of his, William is a fan of participating in conversation where he can have an active input. He’s well-read and clever, but of late his conversation partners have been few and far between, mostly young women and all of them uninteresting. But he can feel how the Queen is waiting, the tension building for him to say something, even though when he regards the Duke once more, the man seems unperturbed by Will’s silence.

The Duke inclines his head in return, and he seems to begin to shift, as if to offer his hand in the current fashion of exchanging oaths, but the Queen holds tight to his arm and the motion is checked. He does not insist on it, but his attention slides briefly toward the Queen, who is watching Will as sharply as she ever did. For what, it isn't clear. His head is too fuzzy from wine to quite put it together yet.

“I trust your journey was pleasant.” Will offers awkwardly, pointedly ignoring the Queen as he takes another sip of wine for want of a distraction. “And the ball is to your liking.”

He means, of course, that the Queen is, but it’s hardly a genuine sentiment.

"It was," Hannibal agrees, though there is a hesitation that suggests it was long, and he was somewhat more tired than to want to endure a ball immediately upon his arrival - but there had been delays on the road, as was typical of carriage travel. His eyes slide to the Queen again, as she settles against his arm like a weight at the end of a chain, and he shifts to cover her hands reassuringly with the hand she is not currently hanging from, and it seems somehow to reassure her. "The ball is pleasant, I apologize for my tardiness."

Here, Hannibal's eyes lingered on the glass of wine in Will's hands, whether in longing or judging if it was the Prince's fourth or fifth, it is difficult to tell. "Even riding ahead, I feared I would miss it entirely." He seems to have something else to say, but he sets it aside for the time being. He isn't immune to how Will's stepmother is paying attention, watching the entire conversation.

"Your kingdom is beautiful, from what I've seen on the road," he continues, so that Will does not have to hold up the burden of conversation. "And the Queen has already made it clear that I am welcome. It sets one at ease."

“The Queen certainly has a knack for doing so.” Will replies, amused by the fact that in company, the Queen can’t chastise him, and later in the evening, he supposes, she will be far too tired to. Such social occasions bore her as they do William, but she still insists upon them. He notes also, with a certain level of satisfaction, that the Duke seems entertained by his lack of tact. He watches the Queen’s grip tighten on the man’s arm and somehow manages to resist rolling his eyes.

Will gestures for a servant to come over, bearing a tray of glasses – he’d seen the look aimed at his own – and deliberately passes one to the Duke before offering one to the Queen. If he’d been younger, he would fear retribution more than now. But the current company is so refreshing from the stale same-old he’s willing to answer for his rudeness and blame wine for his lack of tact, when it comes down to it.

The look of gratitude and - faintly, angled just so that William can see it - relief is worth the risk of chastisement later. It also means the Queen must disengage herself, at least with one hand. Hannibal takes a long sip, as if unaware of the way she is already imposing on him, staking a claim as if to defend him - though she hasn't ever behaved this way with one of her interests around William before. It's a curious sign.

“Do you ride, my lord?” he asks, “The forests skirting the border of our land are well worth exploring.” His eyes flick to the Queen, and for a moment he remembers they were close once, friendly before his father passed away. It’s a subtle thing, perhaps a tilt of her head, a furrowing of brows or the widening of her eyes but Will swallows lightly and adds, “There is a beautiful lake within that the Queen enjoys. Perhaps you’ll find it to your liking also.”

The addition also diffuses the sense of flirtation in the entire conversation, and Will wonders if it’s really worth him finishing the glass in his hand and humiliating himself further.

"I do," Hannibal admits, and his tone is warm - he is fond of riding. "It was suggested to me that you also have a fondness for fine horses. I brought a gift - I hope it doesn't suppose too much." He glances at the Queen - he has brought something for her too, as is appropriate. There is a new necklace of gold and rubies at her throat, something a suitor might give. Unimaginative, but effective, by the way she was behaving. 

"I thought perhaps we might ride," he offers, kindly. "Or at least it might give you a pleasing diversion." 

It seems the Duke has heard enough of this kingdom to allow a little concern into his tone. 

"We must be careful with William," the Queen interjects, but her tone is careful. Graceful as Will has learned to resent. "I don't want him in any danger."

"None at all," Hannibal promises smoothly. The Queen has had, apparently, enough of their interplay. Or perhaps just enough of Will's faint resistance. She begins her goodbyes, and starts to sweep the Duke away, but Hannibal glances back over his shoulder in clear entreaty for a reprisal - a real conversation in the future. 

Perhaps the Duke likes these parties as little as he does.

-

The night wears on, and Will uses most of his energy on staying away from more wine and keeping his head as clear as he can have it. in truth, the ball is a success, with people genuinely enjoying the night and well-wishing showering on the Queen and Duke from all corners of the hall. And despite all that, neither look happy. The Queen keeps Hannibal by her side, towards the end of the evening leaning on him for support as well as out of possessive desire. She retires early, accepting the kiss to her hand with a smile, and leaves the Duke to find his way in his own time. They do not share a chamber, it would be improper before the marriage was seen through, but Will assumes she will know when he retires also.

She hadn’t always been so possessive, so angry and proud. When Will’s father had remarried, and Will had been a child, she was kind to him and gentle, gave him time and attention and not a bad word without reason. But then something changed in her, she grew weaker and sick, and as his father tended to her, so he weakened too. In the space of a week, she had miraculously recovered and Will’s father had passed away, a husk of his former self. After that her protection became obsessive, Will felt smothered, and their friendship faded to memory.

But there are moments, when she looks unwell, when she looks at Will in a way she hasn’t for years, where he remembers and feels a tug at his heart to try again. He doesn’t. And neither does she.

He watches her leave and turns his eyes, instead, to the Duke. He’s not an imposing man, but he radiates power. He can command a room by being in it, and Will finds himself unable to look away now that he’s allowing himself the luxury to look. It takes him a moment to realize his look is being returned with a gentle tilt of lips in a smile. Will swallows, empties the glass in his hand – his willpower has kept him from imbibing more than six – and leaves the hall for the stables.

Outside in the courtyard there is some small commotion as the remainder of the Duke's retinue arrives - tired and in a disarray, but whole and safe. It is small, with only the single carriage and wagon drawn behind with wedding requirements. He brings land and title, and she her own. There is no need for outlandishly lavish gifts, but he has brought enough to contribute to the ceremony. 

The rush is confined to the courtyard for now, Will finds the stables empty of even hands, out as they are to walk down the carriage horses and see them properly curried before they are stabled. It will be a long night for them. 

Within are the usual assortment of steeds - his mother's fine light horse, ruddy brown and with fine delicate features. The carriage horses in a matched set of six - four to draw and two alternates. At the end of these, a taller dapple gray, fine featured and with inquisitive eyes is the first stranger. The warmblood watches him curiously with dark, liquid eyes and a clear easy, sweet disposition. Her nose quests out, seeking, and denies passage without attention.

Will has curled his hands under the heavy chin, scratching until the horse closes its eyes and leans into it, when the voice startles him. He jumps, the horse does not.

"She's not the one," the Duke says, having followed at his own pace. He lifts the back of his hand and runs his knuckles affectionately down the gray's nose, before he tilts his head to the stall next door. "I'm sorry - he has always slept like that. I'm assured it's harmless."

The straw in the next stall is occupied with a heavier horse, with a stockier build that suggests power and easy movement. An arched neck, a mane and tail that flow in long waves - and black enough that it's clear how Will would have missed the animal, even if it weren't curled and sleeping more like a dog at the hearth than a stallion in a stall. 

"I did not know what to bring for you otherwise," the Duke continues, brushing his hands over his own horse's ears as Will takes in the gift. "It's unoriginal, for which I apologize. I just supposed you might like a little speed in your freedom."

Hannibal turns at last from his attention to the steed, with his expression still soft - an admittance. "As I do."

Will doesn’t speak as Hannibal explains, just lets his eyes travel to the horse, dark as pitch, asleep in the stall next to the dapple gray. It’s a fine horse, larger than the one he usually rode – his childhood horse had grown old and lame in the past year, and Will no longer rode it – and an unusual gift to receive from a man he’s never met, even one so powerful as the Duke.

“I do,” he replies at length, unsure if it’s customary to thank someone for such a gift or how to do it. few suitors have ever gotten so close to his stepmother to offer gifts to William. “Ironically freedom is one thing I rarely find here.”

"Your step mother is only worried about you, I think," Hannibal temporizes. "All mothers come to a point where they find it difficult to let go." But he shares a conspiring glance with Will that suggests he may once have been where the boy is, trapped and unable to quite slide his way free. 

Will doesn’t open the stall to interact with his new horse, he lets him sleep, and turns to the Duke instead. He looks tired but far more comfortable outside the hall and its inebriated company. Will inclines his head with a smile.

“He’s a fine gift and unexpected. Thank you.”

A silence falls between them that Will isn’t sure how to class. It’s present but not awkward, doesn’t weigh on either of them or force either to talk to fill it. Will’s head is swimming with wine and indecision and finally he looks up again, taking a breath to speak.

“I want to apologise for my lack of tact earlier,” he says, “My stepmother is a good Queen. She is loved. You compliment each other well.” It’s not completely genuine but there is no hate behind the words. Will isn’t sure why the idea of the Queen marrying again irks him so much, it’s none of his business. Once he comes of age, he’s free to leave the kingdom and find his own fortune; once he is twenty-five she has no hold over him, no one does but himself. His life is completely his own. 

But perhaps because the Duke seems like her polar opposite, not possessive or demanding, vain or proud. He seems calm and clever, someone Will would enjoy spending time with, if he could, without the constraints of the word ‘father’ hanging over them. It’s that, he supposes, that implication that irks him the most.

"I'd rather your honesty than your tact," Hannibal answers, stepping back from his mare with a final pat, to let her return to her hay. "She is a good Queen, and loved - but I had hoped she might grant me the courtesy of coming to know me before she attempted to smother me." 

He chuckles, just once, a soft sound, and tucks his hands behind his back. "No, that's unfair of me. I'm unused to the attention, is all. Culturally, I am used to far more subdued demonstrations of affection." Perhaps most everyone was unused to having their potential wife attached to their arm for much of the night. "Can I see you back?"

The offer is a small one, and well meant - the stable hands have just led in the first of the carriage horses, and their privacy, what little they had, was about to come to an end. Outside, the moon is well up, and the air is cool after the heat of so many bodies inside. "You turn twenty five soon, don't you?"

Will glances up, tilting his head a little to look around Hannibal to see the horses led in, before nodding, turning on his heel to lead the way out of the stables through the other door, leaving the stable hands to settle the horses without interruption.

“In a month,” he confirms, moving his hands to mirror Hannibal’s position as they make their way back to the castle. There are still people in the main hall, the ball will go as long as there is someone to dance, but he skirts around it to lead them up another flight of stairs and away from the music and people.

“It’s both far too close and nigh unreachable from where I stand.” He offers the Duke a small smile, unsure what else to say. He doesn’t ask him his age in return. They pass through an open hallway, with huge windows on one side and tapestries on the other, and Will pauses to lean over the sill into the cold night air and look over the villages below.

“Is it much different?” he asks, turning his head to the Duke, “When your life becomes your own?”

Hannibal is taken with the tapestries, their fantastic illustrations of magical beasts that were once far more common in the land. He runs one hand over the feathered wing of a sewn gryphon, and finds only dust, which seems to amuse him.

"At first, certainly. You are finally released of some expectations - that you are foolish, a child that needs protecting, someone who cannot know how best to share your life with others," he answers at last, and then turns away from the tapestries to lean in the sill next to William, but his eyes seek the forest and the lake, rather than the faint lights of the villages, burning against what things might come in the dark. And even in so idyllic a kingdom, they might well. "But it's also terrifying. You hold yourself in your own hands only, and it feels as if it might spill at any time. Most find someone whom they trust to hold a part of themselves - others simply learn how to carry it."

The Duke smiles again, genuine, turning his attention toward Will. "I'm not certain which is better, but your stepmother is strong enough to know how to do it both ways. It should be envied, but it's also somewhat sad."

There is something in his tone that hints of more, that he is speaking of something that's beyond what he's speaking of, but Hannibal does not elaborate, he simply settles in, watching the night. "Will you forgive me if I beg leave to retire, Prince? I have come a long way, and there are preparations to begin on the morrow. I do," he stops, hesitates briefly, and looks up the stairs further. "I enjoy speaking with you. I hope you won't have so terrible a headache tomorrow as to not want to ride. I think I may need the escape for a few hours, if you don't mind being my excuse."

Will takes the answer in, nodding, and lets his eyes go out of focus until the lights blur together and become a strange mosaic of gold and white. A life is a heavy burden to carry, especially your own. He blinks and doesn’t think on it more, turning instead to look at Hannibal as the other seeks to leave. He smiles as the other hesitates, tilts his head as he continues, and ducks it on a smile. His mind is a happy, warm numbness at the moment, he doubts it will be quite so comfortable when the sun rises.

“Of course, I wouldn’t keep you.” He replies, pushing off to continue down the hall to where the Duke’s chambers are. His own are further, in another wing of the castle, where the Queen’s are. He’ll make his way there eventually. He sees the man to his door and steps back to give him space to enter on his own.

“I shall look for you in the dining hall,” he says, inclining his head in a slight bow, “Perhaps we can take the horses out before the evening meal, enjoy the day and let them graze while the sun is still here for spring.” He would enjoy the day. Very much. Not only was the man new company, he wasn’t demanding anything of him. it was comfortable and new and very welcome.

He gives the Duke a genuine, warm smile before turning to walk away, letting him go in on his own, in his own time. He heads for the end of the corridor and takes one of the side doors to a spiral staircase that leads him to the top of one of the towers, the door closing behind him.

Hannibal pauses at the door of his quarters to watch the Prince go. He isn't certain what the instinct is, exactly, that draws his attention to the man so soundly, but there is something that keeps bringing him back. There was some power in the young man. Not as much as the Queen, certainly, but enough to leave the Duke piqued in his interest. 

He has not been here long enough to put the puzzle together, but he begins to see the pieces. 

The room he has been given is large, but sparse - a guest quarters designed to be filled with all the various and sundry objects that royal guests tended to drag along with themselves - Hannibal will not fill it even a quarter of the way with what he has brought. The marriage may be rushed, but the arrangements for re-negotiating where the new heart of the kingdom will lie may take some time afterward. He would prefer, of course, to maintain his own capitol - but it is the seat of his power as much as this is likely the seat of the Queen's. A compromise will eventually be struck.

If she doesn't find him out or grow tired of him over the next week. Sorceress Queens could be fickle. Hannibal was both patient enough and confident enough to see this trick through either way. The Queen's possessive nature would wear on him, until she faded into a certainty that he was as much hers as anybody's, he assumed. In the meantime, the Prince was intriguing, and the moonlight here was stronger than what it was in his own kingdom, where the mountains reached up and took so much of the sky. 

Tired as he is, he doesn't sleep immediately - for a long time he stands at the window and looks down and out, and puts his thoughts and plans together in slow lines, assembling contingencies for those things he hadn't expected.

-

Will remembers his father telling him that coming of age is something people face differently. He had been lucky enough to know Will’s mother by then, so he shared his fear, and his confusion with her, and they got through it well. Others choose to be alone, it’s easier to figure out how you balance and shape when your life is only yours and no one else’s. Others can fluctuate, can choose to trust someone with sharing their life or choose to carry it alone.

“It’s not a burden,” he’d told him, when Will had frowned, “It’s something very special. Something wholly yours.”

“Right now it’s not mine. Do we have two lives?” Will had asked. “One we share, and then one we keep?” His father had paused, tilted his head, and nodded.

“We all have two lives.” He agreed, “The second begins when you realize you only have one.”

The towers serve as storage keeps for the strangest things in a castle. Old spinning wheels, broken statues, unfinished or torn tapestries… the towers were places Will explored as a child, and he goes to them often the closer he gets to his twenty-fifth birthday. This tower is at the south end of the castle, it’s the coldest and tallest, and takes him ten minutes to navigate the spiral staircase to the very top. It’s also the only tower filled completely with books – it’s the driest enough to house them.

Some of the books are old, others no longer pertinent to the ways the kingdom runs, but they’re never thrown away, just left in the tower to await their time to be found. Will has tried to give the tower order, but it never sticks. The books are piled from floor to ceiling, some are stacked, others layered to create shelves for others to stand on. It’s a magnificent place, and one Will enjoys spending his time in.

It’s very late now, and freezing. He can hear the music drift out from the windows of the hall far below the tower. If he leans far enough out he can see the trees cast slight shadows where the lights hit them from the windows. He leans out far enough to breathe, closes his eyes, and leans back in. 

He isn’t sure why he’s come up here now, when his mind is swimming in wine and the walk up had rendered him very nearly violently ill. Perhaps because there’s a potential for a new friend, someone to confide in and talk to, perhaps because today is exactly one month until William turns twenty-five, perhaps because every time he’s come up here, he’s found an answer to something he wasn’t even asking.

Will pushes back from the window, rolls his shoulders and rubs his eyes to clear them. He has to take the stairs down with the way his head is already spinning, and he would sleep up here instead if he wasn’t certain he’d never wake up again, frozen to death in a nest of books. He absently takes a book off the nearest pile to adopt and keep in his room instead, and very gracefully trips on a corner of a heavy tome and sends a small pile cascading over the floor and down the stairs. He winces, listens to hear if anyone was disturbed by the noise – unlikely – before carefully picking his way to the stairs to collect the books he can reach from the first few steps.

That done, he braves the stairs down again. It takes longer, perhaps because he’s more tired, perhaps because the alcohol is making his brain uncooperative. He nearly kills himself tripping over a book that had landed further down the stairs than any of the others, and his curse rings through the stone tower until it has nothing left to echo off of. Then Will bends to collect the book. He’s more than halfway down the steps now, he can’t begin to imagine walking back up to return a book he hadn’t specifically chosen, so he pushes it next to the other, under his arm, and continues on his way.

When he reaches his room, he collapses face first into the bed, books forgotten and tumbled to the floor by his boots, and lets sleep take him over.

He dreams of black horses and endless fields, of reaching his hand out to someone he can’t see, and a feather quill dipping into red ink that spreads on the page as soon as it touches it.

-

The Duke endures a day of plans and portents with grace. There is a lot to consult in a royal wedding, and though all of it is simply planning at this point, Hannibal is involved wherever the Queen asks him to be. By mid-afternoon his privacy has been thoroughly invaded, he has had his first fitting with the royal tailor, and he has managed to ingratiate himself with most everyone. The charm is something he counts himself lucky for, at times. 

At other times, such as when he declines three offers of tea from royal ladies on the insistence that he has other arrangements - yes already - Hannibal emerges from such situations flustered. He catches William outside the dining hall instead of within it.

"If we go in, we'll never get out again," he warns, and his smile is tired, but genuine and conspiratorial. "I've sent my squire to gather something for us to eat, and I think we can see to saddling our own horses so we don't attract an entire retinue."

Will glances up, somewhat disoriented still, but finds himself nodding with a small smile. The morning had not been a particularly pleasant affair as he had – as predicted – woken up with an agonizing headache and spent most of the early hours burrowing himself further under the covers to get away from even the slightest sliver of light.

Then the evening’s conversation came back to him and he made a very graceless attempt at getting out of bed and making himself presentable. The water had helped, but his head was still not quite his own. He hoped the fresh air would help. He also hoped the Duke would forgive him his rudeness until he was clear-headed enough to speak coherently. As it were, he straightened his shoulders and refrained from pressing a hand against his forehead as they made their way outside.

In the yard, they avoid attention. The Duke has dressed demurely, comfortably to ride in - it isn't, after all, a pageant but simply a ride for the sheer enjoyment of it. To get to know each other. The stable seems to put Hannibal at ease, even though this one must be foreign.

"The Queen tells me she does not often ride," Hannibal says. His command of the stables is almost as precise as that he seems to effortlessly exert over a room - he has an order and a rhythm that he settles into easily, recovering his saddle and bridle, and checking them to be sure they're clean and in good order. "Something I find unfortunate to learn. Though I suppose after enough time, all things must lose their charm."

Will smiles and tries to hide how ironic the expression is. Yes, he supposes, after three hundred years certain activities would become rather dull.

“Perhaps, thankfully, I have yet to reach the age where riding loses its appeal to me. You’ll have good company if you pardon my incoherence until my head clears.” He takes down his own saddle, the one he uses for riding for pleasure rather than show, and the matching bridle before moving to the stall that houses his new steed.

"Nor have I," Hannibal agrees, noting that Will seems to be suffering a little less when he's distracted, but the ride will likely tax the man's endurance. Hannibal watches him move and seems to come to a decision. He knows just the thing.

Hannibal cannot quite maintain casualness when Will finally approaches the stall where his gift is on his feet and peering out through the long, wavy forelock with ears tilted forward and mouth full of hay - it somewhat ruins the elegant, warlike appearance of the black horse, but leaves little doubt as to the animal's disposition. 

Will can’t help but smile. He’s a beautiful thing, tall and lithe and proud, and looking so wonderfully dishevelled when caught off guard as he was. Will sets the saddle and bridle down and reaches out to rest his palm near the horse’s nose, letting him come on his own. He does, curiously nuzzling Will’s hand before pulling back and finishing his breakfast, perfectly content to have Will open the door to the stall and move around him. He’s so well trained Will is almost disappointed that he won’t get to break him in. since he was allowed his own horse, he’s always taken responsibility for breaking it in, training it and caring for it. His father had encouraged it. the Queen had thought it a useless pastime.

“We rarely get such majestic horses here,” Will says, setting the saddle on the horse’s back and kneeling to adjust the straps that will secure it, “Are they common where you’re from?”

"Not common as such," Hannibal suggests. He swings open the stall door for his gray, lifts his hand once to give an indicative tug to her bridle, and that's all she seems to need before she follows him out, and then stands politely without needing to be placed in cross tie. "But the breed originates in a neighboring kingdom, and I've become slightly enamored."

His own mare is markedly different - just as tall and well built in her own way, but lacking some of the solid mass. He is tightening the girth when his squire - an older man though the title might imply a boy were Hannibal a knight and not a Duke - arrives with a carefully packed meal.

Hannibal down within and pulls forth the water skin, which he holds for several moments while they speak, working the water around inside. "I suppose anyone might, when faced with such a picture." He smiles, and offers the skin, when Will has freed his hands. 

The Duke's animal follows him like a puppy - likely no sorcery there, he rewards her with bits of carrot and cubes of grain that smell faintly sweet and of apples whenever there is a pause in their rhythm, and he seems to have a gentle way with the animal. Perhaps there is the answer to the mystery of why Will's horse is so well behaved.

"I am glad you ride," he admits at last, as they walk their horses out of the stables. Will finds the water within the skin sweet beyond the normal sort of fresh clean water taste - or at least it seems to be on the first sip. On the second, it seems like perhaps he was only thirsty. But the relief in his head is immediate and increases with every sip. "It's my escape."

It takes a lot of willpower to not empty the water skin and Will lets is hang from his fingers as he leads his own horse out, careful, and pleasantly surprised when he follows as easily as Hannibal’s follows him. the man seems calm here, happier amongst the gentle, quiet creatures than around people, and yet he doesn’t seem to mind Will’s company. He ties the water skin to his saddle, not wanting to burden Hannibal with it, and mounts, taking a moment to get used to the height and the feel of the new horse under him.

He clicks his tongue, leads him forward a few steps before backing up. The horse responds beautifully and Will gives Hannibal a wide smile. He can feel the familiar rush that comes with the knowledge that for a few hours he will be moving so fast no one will catch him. Into the forest, around it, out past the lake and to the border of their lands. It’s the only freedom the Queen still allows him, more because she can’t stop him taking his mount out than because she approves of the activity. He can also feel the strange warmth from the water he’d drunk, something he can’t explain but feels he doesn’t need to. It makes him feel alive.

“Yes,” he agrees, and it’s half a laugh, half a breathless word and he smiles wider. He waits for Hannibal to mount his own horse, to give her the attention she wants before returning Will’s smile though perhaps not quite so enthusiastically. He’s a man that smiles with his eyes, not his mouth, and Will turns away before he’s caught staring.

“The lake is straight through from here,” he says, “It will take less than an hour at a canter,”

Hannibal follows the direction Will indicates with his eyes, to take his bearing. He shifts his weight to be fully comfortable in the saddle, and then for the briefest instant, his smile turns downright mischievous at Will's last statement. Less than an hour at a canter apparently appeals to something surprisingly competitive in him, or some pride.

He doesn't seem to need to give much signal - he takes up his reins, adjusts his seat and presses his heels just so and the horse gathers herself under him and leaps forward rather than starting at a polite walk, leaving the ringing sounds of hooves behind him in cadence as she launches herself into a gallop.

Will's horse brings his head up, pulls the bridle and when Will lets go of the slight pressure holding him back, gives chase. The horses are fine and in good spirits, and Hannibal does not push his mare, simply asks her for what she is willing to give, and the gallop is free spirited, fast - an escape, much as the Duke had suggested. 

He looks alive as he rides, leaning down and balancing in the stirrups, reactive and responsive. Hannibal seems almost to forget the rest of the world, but at the edge of the woods his horse has slowed and he draws her up, his own breathing quick, his expression pleased. It hadn't taken Will's horse long to catch up, so they draw up even at the edge of the woods, easing to a trot.

He lets Will take the lead and set the pace, more careful amongst the leaves and low brush that grows beneath the trees. He was mindful of a stumble here, though Will is clearly an able rider. 

As it grows thicker they both draw to a walk, just enjoying the weather, the ride, the company - Hannibal can see the lake ahead, the water shining and quiet. "When did you begin riding?" he asks, in genuine curiosity. It was clear he enjoyed it as much as Hannibal had heard he would. It's a very gentle request for more information - the invitation for William to talk about himself, if he'd like.

Will smiles, hands loose on the reins, and head back to enjoy the sparse sun as it strikes through the leaves. He knows the path well enough to navigate with gentle pushes of his knees to steer his steed, he doesn’t need to look.

“My father only let me ride when I knew how to saddle a horse properly and how to brush it clean and pick its hooves after. I was seven when I got my first pony. Twelve when I got my horse.” He opens his eyes and turns his head to his companion, gently clicking his tongue to guide his horse around a dip in the ground that could unsettle it.

“We would ride often. Through the forest, to the borders of the land so I knew where they were. Up to the mountains for days at a time just to see how far we could go.” he lets the silence rest between them a moment, just remembering, before shaking that away and rubbing a gentle palm against his horse’s neck.

Hannibal listens attentively, watching with clear and genuine interest that he seems to reserve for particularly interesting people. The memories that come forth seem happy and distant, a brief reprieve into the past. Will rarely looks like this when he is off in his thoughts of more recent times.

“It became difficult to get out as far when he’d passed away. And of late my horse has become lame, and I can’t do more than walk him with me to a meadow to graze. Your gift came at an opportune time.” He sends Hannibal a smile and ducks his head.

“You seem like you’ve been riding all your life also,” he suggests, after a moment, “How long have you had your mare?”

"She is only six," Hannibal explains, just as willing to speak. "Though I have been in the saddle as often as I could manage since my father first sat me atop one." He smiles back. "But I wasn't very good when I started. My mother worried that all the falls would harm me permanently, and I got a succession of ever shorter ponies."

The memory brings an amused smile. "I have gotten better since," he explains, unnecessarily. "And I've learned more about them. It's better to understand and compromise than to force a creature to your will. She'll do anything I ask, because there have been times when I have done what she has. And because I spoil her until she is fit to burst her girth."

Will laughs and shakes his head, finding it hard to believe that the man who rode so well and so freely with him now would fall off his mount as a child. It’s a strangely vulnerable piece of information that Will is grateful for. It makes the man seem real, human, more than just a man looking to unite his country’s wealth with the Queen’s. 

"You speak so fondly of your father. I'm sorry that you were so young when you lost him," Hannibal continues, on a more serious note. Even though they have clearly arrived at the lakeshore he makes no move to dismount. He lets his horse stop and drop her head to pull fresh green grass - the headstall he uses has no bit, so it will not create a sticky mess to be cleaned later. "You seem to carry him with you, at least. It's not the same but at times it can be enough."

Will shrugs, taking a moment before dismounting and allowing his horse to do as he pleases. He doubts he’ll dart away so he leaves the reins over his neck lightly, allowing him freedom to drink from the lake or graze as Hannibal’s horse was doing.

“It was years ago now.” He replies. Most of the anger and pain has faded in time, leaving occasional days of numbness, but those Will has learned to easily control and distract himself from when they happen. “He was a smart man. He taught me well.”

He doesn’t linger on the topic, choosing instead to walk to the water’s edge and kneel to wash his hands, bringing them up to press the cool water to his neck and over his face before cupping his hands to drink. The lake wasn’t large, perhaps would take less than two hours to circle the perimeter on horseback, but it was tranquil and quiet. In summer, Will came here often to swim and read and just rest in the grass without the pressures of the kingdom weighing him down. When he’d been much younger, his stepmother had enjoyed the lake as well.

“If you wish we can ride to the border,” he says, turning back and finding himself having to look up at Hannibal, “Just past the lake is another clearing and after that,” he makes a gesture, hands out and fingers splayed, to show how endless the land seemed.

Hannibal has similarly loosed his mare to do as she pleased, though he holds the reins in his hand, effectively rendering her headstall into a bridle, to be sure she won't tangle herself in them. He looks out over the expanse of the lake, enjoying the quiet. A flick of his hands drapes the reins around her neck in a loose loop so they hang down over his shoulders. 

"I'm not having second thoughts quite that strong," Hannibal answers, finding himself practically on top of Will when he looks back. He had moved absently toward the edge of the water, looking up the length of the shore to where the trees touched down into the water itself, dipping long limbs. "Though some of the Queen's attendants are somewhat overbearing."

It's said with tact and a smile. "And the Queen would miss us at supper." It's a truth. Neither Hannibal nor Will are like to find much freedom until after the wedding. After that... there are still things to sort. Still, he enjoys this chance to get away. He steps back to remove himself from Will's space and turns to pull the saddlebags off of his mare - just in time, as nearly the instant he has them free, she is plunging herself into the lake for a swim. 

"It promises to be a damp ride back," Hannibal laments, "But at least our meal is safe, for now." 

Will blinks and allows himself to just watch for a moment. It’s unusual to have horses take to water as easily and quickly as Hannibal’s mare had and he finds himself fascinated, his smile a mixture of bewildered and very much amused. He hesitates before removing the water skin from the saddle, just in case.

Within the bags Hannibal finds a blanket on which to sit, which he lays over a fallen tree so they can both sit looking out over the lake, and the rest is various foods, enough for both of them to have a decent lunch while the horses swim - the black having taken the idea from his mare. "Tell me about your kingdom," he asks, when they have settled. "I know it only as an outsider."

Will tears his eyes from the horses and gives Hannibal a rueful smile.

“I’m afraid I am not the man to ask.” He apologises, “You probably know it better than I do. All I know, I’ve read in books.” They settle for a moment in quiet, Will keeping his eyes down as he thinks, Hannibal giving him the space and time to come up with a reply. Their kingdom is not the largest in the realm, nor is it one that prides itself in having the most exotic and beautiful creatures within it.

“It’s been a long time since I’ve been amongst the people, but I remember it being a good place. A safe one.” Will offers after a moment, “When last I went, there was a silk factory, I remember, and the silk that had been dyed was hanging in the sun to dry. Massive long sheets of every color flowing in the wind like magnificent wings.” He glances up, “That’s how I remember it. As magic and color.”

He licks his lips and laughs quietly, rubbing the back of his neck. “It’s childish, but the people are happy. There’s peace here. Not more problems than we’re able to handle.”

Watching him carefully, Hannibal takes in what he's saying as he eats, considering Will's words. He seems surprised by the notion that Will didn't explore within his own kingdom, especially since he'd seemed so willing to come out riding. It wasn't a fear that kept him in, or a disinterest in exploring. It's another piece to the puzzle. Hannibal is too polite to ask about it, but the information has hooked into him, and he will investigate until he has an answer. 

Will takes up an apple from the assortment of food arrayed and tosses it from one hand to the other, wondering if he should keep it for his horse or spoil him at home.

“What about yours?” he asks, looking up again, “How do you see your Dukedom?” Will wonders if the way Hannibal sees his territory is the way those living in it do. He doesn’t suppose he’s a cruel lord, or a demanding one.

"It is mostly mountains around the capitol," Hannibal begins, after a moment of consideration - not on how to best paint his land in a pleasing light but because there is a lot to summarize. "The people are crafters or farmers, making furniture or carving wood. But the land itself is cold and high up. It does not seem to have as much sky - at least not down in the heart of the mountain range."

He smiles, and takes up the water skin to have a sip. "There are troubles, but no more so than elsewhere. On occasion we still see magical beasts - or so the people will tell you, pridefully. It is uninteresting, but not in a bad way."

Hannibal chuckles. "The people are anxious for something unusual to celebrate. The engagement has been spoken of warmly. I only hope the Queen does not decide I'm entirely too dull."

The statement gives Hannibal pause as some thought occurs to him. There is a connection forming between the Queen's fickle history and sudden interest in being married only now, her protective nature, and her possessive one. There is a key here, that will make it all make sense, Hannibal is certain.

"I'm surprised you don't explore more," Hannibal suggests gently, though he is clearly prying for information. Perhaps a better idea of how this situation defined itself would make things clearer to him.

Will’s lips quirk a little but the smile is not a genuine one, if anything it’s a little confused. It’s been years since Will has gone to the village alone, or further than the forest. And it’s not that he has no time – he has all the time in the world – or that he lacks the desire to… but there is always something stopping him. Lessons when he was younger, duties and demands when he’d grown. And even now, when he’s here, at the lake with the Duke, he feels the strange tug to be somewhere else, to be back in the castle and safe.

Safe.

He frowns.

“I suppose I’ve outgrown the impulsive desire to explore,” he laments, “Or maybe it’s just that I need the appropriate companion to join me.”

His smile fades as soon as it appears and Will looks away, out over the water, as his teeth crunch into the apple for want of something to do. To shut himself up before he says anything else blatantly stupid. He has found himself falling into the trap of having no problem flirting when it’s required of him, and all the trouble in the world when it’s inappropriate. Perhaps a good gauge and a good habit, but – as he chews slowly and forces his eyes to stay on the horses enjoying the water – inevitably pushing him further and further into inappropriate territory with the Duke.

The complex play of emotions doesn't totally escape Hannibal. He doesn't quite smile in return, something distracts him, and he glances back in the direction they'd come, briefly. As if he could see the anchor tethering Will back to someplace safe. 

"What do you do then, if not explore? What takes up your time - I hope not all balls and girls," Hannibal attempts to ease the sudden tension. At twenty four, William was too young to marry as a Royal Heir, but certainly not too young to be entertaining the notion of who he would like to once his life became his own. That he had not danced with anyone that Hannibal saw during the previous evening did not mean much.

Hannibal is used to charming those around him, and prefers to have people positively disposed toward him. It meant in some ways that things got easier, and that they did not tend to watch him as closely. It serves his purposes. Little has come from his country by way of rumors of the Grand Duke - only that he was a fair ruler, that his subjects did not have an overbearing burden of pressure upon them from their rulers. It was said he had never married, and only recently come into power, when the aged Duchess had finally passed on - though he had effectively ruled the kingdom for years. 

He hadn't expected quite so many smiles from William, but he does not mind them like he minds the flirtations of the court women, or the possessiveness of the Queen herself, but he isn't sure what to make of the overtures. Friendliness - or perhaps simply loneliness, he supposes. The court seemed to lack others of the same age as the Prince. It seemed a strange picture. Another puzzle piece. 

Will nods very slightly, grateful for the change of topic.

“I’m, sadly, not fond of balls. Nor have I met anyone of my age who I find remotely interesting.” He shrugs, “I spar, I care for my horse ad take him out daily to graze. He’ll have a companion now.” He turns back to the horses now pawing at the stony lake bank, manes and tails dripping. Having two horses will take up more time, of course, but Will isn’t sure why there’s something niggling at the back of his mind that suggests he should be doing more than this.

“I read.” He finishes. “There’s a tower filled with books, it’s never the same and the order of them keeps changing, yet I’ve never seen anyone else go up there.” He takes another bite of his apple and chews thoughtfully before swallowing and licking his lips clean of excess juice.

"Books have a power all their own," Hannibal suggests mildly, amusedly. The introversion was surprising, given how he seemed to receive Hannibal's company without hitch or complaint, but in a way it was uniquely Will. Or perhaps the effect had held over him for so long that he had embraced it as his own. "You'll find they wander for attention. Some demand to be read - I find it better never to ignore that sort."

“I attend councils as the Queen requires of me but those are rare.” Will sounds distant now, lost in thought. Surely, surely there was more to his life than such a boring routine! He had been so active as a child, so curious and quick, and he seems to have crawled to a standstill the closer he gets to twenty-five.

“I guess I’m not quite worthy as an interesting companion,” he says in jest, but his expression is only partially amused.

"No," the Duke disagrees clearly. "One simply has to work a little harder that's all. Your routine is one that you find works. If you have no thirst for adventure, it means you'll settle easier into life. I might say it would make for a fine king, but..."  
With a Queen three hundred years old, it was unlikely Will would ever have to worry about much other than being a Prince, unless the worst should happen. He was a contingency, a safety - perhaps that weighed a little on the man. Perhaps it made him feel trapped and inadequate. "But I have enjoyed your company. Perhaps I might impart a taste for adventure, or you might teach me to settle a little. Perhaps both."

Will considers the words and finds them a comfort, as acceptance always is. He turns to look out over the lake again and settles more comfortably against the blanket, taking some bread and cheese to enjoy with his apple as the afternoon wears on.

Hannibal finishes his food and then sits back, watching the horses at play with what starts as amusement, and then finally softens to fondness. After a time of quiet, he asks, "What will you call him?"

Will purses his lips in thought before tilting his head and considering.

“Winston.” He says finally, not giving any elaboration as to why, but it seems to suit the animal. They fall into another comfortable silence and Will shifts to lie back, staring at the sky and thinking. He doubts he’ll see the man much later in the evening, with more preparations and the Queen’s obsession with keeping the man near. He finds he’s very much enjoyed the quiet company while it’s been given him. he turns to regard the man where he sits, lets his eyes linger before sliding them down and away.

“If she’s had you fitted for the wedding the worst is over.” he offers, tone slightly more amused than he supposes is proper. His lips quirk and he lets his eyes return to meet Hannibal’s. “Now you just have one week of useless planning.”

He knows they should get back, but he is wont to be the first to suggest it.

"Only the first of three fittings," Hannibal answers, with a tolerant sigh. "But I suppose that appearances are important. The wedding is for the kingdom, not us as such. Planning is better than rushing ahead."

He meets Will's eyes with a smile that says he is appreciative for the company all the same. "That doesn't mean I won't want to escape ever so slightly now and again. It's been a pleasure but..."

Hannibal lifts himself off the blanket, and stretches his back out full, then whistles the horses back in. It was nearing time when they both were expected back to work planning - William had a fitting of his own, as he was expected to attend the wedding in impeccable style. "Your birthday is soon, I haven't forgotten. Let's ride as far as we can that day - if the Queen hasn't already set about other plans for us."

Will gives him a strange look, just watching him move and not making the effort to follow just yet. After a moment, however, he forces himself up to greet his dripping but apparently thoroughly pleased horse and work on adjusting the saddle.

Fussing over the thoroughly soaked tack, Hannibal checks the girth on his mare and lets it out, and then unloops the reins from around his neck to re-attach them to the headstall. "I am sorry that it will be so damp all the way back. I had forgotten what a terrible influence she could be."

Will just smiles, bending down to get another apple from the basket and offering it to Winston. It’s very well received.

“I’m sure I could have a far worse influence,” he says finally, scratching gently at the horse’s hose as he enjoys his treat. “And a far worse ride back than simply a damp saddle. Regardless, he removes his jacket to line the saddle with, water-proof side down. It would be unbecoming to return to the castle with his riding pants wet in the most inappropriate places. He has a moment where Will considers tipping into the lake himself so the return isn’t quite as awkward but it passes. Perhaps another time.

He helps pack up their lunch, offering to carry it back as Hannibal had to carry it here, and they set off again, leisurely walking the horses through the forest before stopping at the edge of the trees where they can see the castle again. Will chews his lip and gives Hannibal a sidelong glance before clicking his tongue and urging his horse forward, leaving the other behind as Hannibal had left him earlier in the day.

"Tch!" Hannibal is caught unawares, but in good humor, and he barely has to press his heels into the mare's flank before she's racing to catch up. Winston does not give up his lead easily once he has it, and it leaves Hannibal and his mare chasing after for most of the ride back. But it's an elevated feeling, a pleased one. 

They arrive at the castle breathless and flushed, the horses in good spirits, and still the better part of soaking wet. Hannibal apologizes to the stable boys for the wet tack and only slightly less wet horses, as he turns them over to their care. They both have places to be, expectations to fill, but for a little while, Hannibal and Will had escaped them and found something easier to be.

The coat had helped but not much, and Will needs to change before he can join the Duke and Queen in the dining hall for dinner. His heart is pounding from the race, smile genuine and wide, and he drops his head back to breathe, feeling the most free he had been in what felt like years. He runs a hand through his hair, and suddenly the idea of a fitting he himself has to endure is not quite as painful.

Hannibal catches Will gently by the arm as they go to part ways - he doesn't seem to have anything to say, he just offers a grateful smile, and then as an afterthought tacks on, "Winston is a fine name. I'm glad he suits you."

But the court ladies have found him, even damp and unsuitably dressed as he is, and they pull Hannibal away to be ready for his dinner and further preparations, and he goes, leaving Will to the rest of his day and hopefully in better spirits.

Will watches him go and tries to convince himself his smile didn’t widen.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When the accidental flirting makes a gentle segue into an actual royal affair.
> 
> -
> 
> Pretty masturbation and UST in this sweethearts, enjoy!~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Because who the heck could resist that??

It's accidental, the first time. Hannibal seems to have a wanderlust that drives him to explore and a need for moments of privacy that sends him further up into the spires and towers than most others would dare. He runs his hands over the rough stones and soft tapestries and lets the castle tell him where it is most travelled and least travelled. He isn't sure quite what draws him up to the tower where all the books are kept, but there is a subtle tugging in the air that brings him there.

The Queen's power extends through much of the castle, like the faint smell of perfume perhaps, but there are places where it lingers more strongly - notably around Will's quarters. Hannibal supposes it's protective, given the nature the Queen had. But there is something strange about the flavor of the magic.

Here, there is no lingering scent of magic, amongst the books. It is a place she apparently does not come often, and Hannibal finds the books themselves fascinating - so many and shifting. They seemed to jostle each other for attention, and he touches spines reverently until one comes to his hands, and he folds it open and settles back into a pile of others, which seemed to have loosely arranged themselves for just such a thing. 

The tale is interesting and old, a history. Will finds him settled back amongst the books, casually intruding on a space he had mentioned as someplace he enjoyed. But if the first time is unintended, leaving the Duke smiling in faint embarrassment and admitting he was hiding from attention.

The second time, he has brought two warm drinks, and timed it so that when Will arrives, both are still steaming - one set at his own elbow, and the other waiting for Will's arrival in clear invitation - and part apology for intruding. He barely gets away with the wedding plans proceeding apace, but he's managed to find an hour or two to come and enjoy the histories up here, late in the evenings.

Will finds, after the first initial shock, that he enjoys the Duke’s company even here where he did not expect or intend to see him. For the hours they can get away, they read, glassed lanterns around the tower – they had found that simple candles snuffed out quickly by some unknown wind where no window was open for a breeze – enjoying the space and the company.

Will’s part in the wedding is not nearly as large as Hannibal’s, for obvious reasons, but he still finds himself pulled every which way for fittings and planning, private sessions with his stepmother and her advisors about how to split the rule of the two principalities when there is such a distance between them. He also finds, strangely, that the longer he spends in the tower, the freer he feels. 

In the space of two days Will has extended his rides – alone and with company – to reach farther than he dared them before. If he escapes for the day, he is unfound, knowing where to guide Winston to not be followed, knowing how to return him to the stables so no one finds a way to put him in another stall where Will would have a harder time getting to him. It’s freeing and addictive, and the days stop crawling for him.

He finds the Duke attempting his own escapes, though few are as successful as William’s. Besides the tower, he’s seen him in the stables late at night, talking to his mare in a foreign tongue Will can only assume is from his own country. He’s seen him walking the halls slowly, but no matter how fast Will ran to catch up he never seemed to be able to. He finds himself wanting to save the man when he’s surrounded by fawning ladies of the court, or held in the painful grip of the Queen. Finds himself sending the man more cryptic looks that linger before glancing away and never explaining them.

He finds himself, sometimes, unable to sleep. Mind too preoccupied with his day or thinking ahead to the next evening in the tower. The books Will had taken with him, the first night the Duke had arrived, sit neglected in his room, but he hasn’t the heart to return them. On their evenings together, he and the Duke rarely speak, but it doesn’t seem to matter to either of them.

It is on the fifth day, two nights before the wedding, that Will finds himself dressed better than his casual eveningwear as he climbs the stairs to the tower.

Warm eyes look up from reading to greet him, and then they hesitate - pause on the carefully arrayed clothes and linger, and Hannibal's fingers stroke lightly down the page he had been reading as if in sympathy for running over the fabric. They have already found a comfortable arrangement of silence when they need one, and Hannibal deeply appreciates it. 

It also helps him, when they are sitting up here, to shake the gentle webs of magic insinuating holds on Will loose. He isn't sure what purpose they serve, and he is careful not to leave his signature on the magic as he pulls it free - usually through the offering of food or beverage, occasionally by casual touch. 

He wants to see what will happen when William is freed of the holds on him, but he has to work slowly, carefully. He has already seen the Prince riding out on the black horse on occasion, and felt as if his own spirit could go with the man, while he stood and endured fussing or helped pick particular colors of flowers and finery, and a flock of white ravens - luckier than doves.

Hannibal passes him the drink, their hands brush briefly at the transfer of ownership, and another few webs fall free. "I had begun to worry they'd keep you all evening," Hannibal begins - it's a breach to speak first, but he finds himself relieved to see the man. He has come to find the Prince a breath of fresh air, an escape from the oppressive possession he had to endure when the Queen imposed her presence upon him. He could feel the woman reaching out with the same fine, intricate webs, and he allowed them to sit like a fine film on his skin, but it tired him.

He smiles, however, and feels easier of heart when William takes the drink and sips it, and he reaches for his own, closing his mouth over the edge of the cup and watching Will's mouth do the same, before there is more of that same eye contact that has become common for them, across rooms and distances. Not quite a comfort, not quite attention - but something different. Hannibal has yet to put his finger fully upon it.

Will hums quietly against the rim of the cup and licks his lips when he sets it down.

“As did I,” he admits. Today was another fitting, as well as a council. Will had found himself more engaged with the session, finding that the villages were thriving more this summer than they had the last, that certain councilmen were more inclined to suck up to the Queen than others… it had been fascinating to watch. And he’d found his stepmother giving him a strange look, one a mix of fear and anger, but somehow not directed at Will. He’d left the meeting slightly dizzy and confused, and more than happy to spend his evening in the tower.

Will takes another sip of his drink when he’s settled, a book nudging his arm until he lifts it so it can slide onto his lap and rest still as though it never moved, but he doesn’t look at it, just at Hannibal, taking in the bags under his eyes, the way his mouth pressed into a tense line before relaxing. He seems more exhausted by the show of charm and politeness than anything else, and Will wonders if there is anything he can do, realistically, to help.

“Shall we go riding tomorrow?” he asks, offering the only other activity he knows they both adore, another chance to spend time together and away from everything else weighing on them. He parts his lips to say more and bites the bottom one in thought as he considers whether or not it would be appropriate. He decides, at last, that Hannibal would not find offense in it.

“If I can catch you in the hall, of course. You are neither blind nor deaf to me when I follow you and yet I seem to never be able to match your pace.”

Looking up from the pages beneath his fingers at the offer, Hannibal looks wistful and desirous at the notion of riding. He has not managed to find time to do more than visit his horse. He clearly desires to do so very badly, but responsibilities hold onto him tightly enough to make him feel as if he is drowning. He supposes that once the wedding ends, his time will free up.

"Tomorrow we are arranging guest tables and seating charts," Hannibal says mildly, but without much interest. "And there is some sort of ceremony to be held involving water that I am expected to be present at, since it is theoretically for my benefit."

The purification ceremony, as the Queen had been previously married, symbolically refreshing her spirit and mind to allow her to embrace a new husband without thoughts of the old. It would be long and likely full of ladies fawning over her, and fawning at him. 

He takes a deep breath, obviously regretful, and then considers. "We might sneak out after the sun has set..." Hannibal muses, fingers stroking the page of the book in his lap, and he tilts his chin against the palm of his hand, only then seeming to realize what Will had said at the last - he had clearly been so enticed by riding. He smiles, amused by his own distractibility. 

"The castle has a way of luring me deeper and turning me around," he says. "It's not my doing, I don't think - there's some lingering magic that reaches out and twists things just so." Perhaps the Queen sought to keep them as separate as possible. It was a very possessive sort of magic, though which of the two it was seeking more to protect is uncertain. He could not untangle it without reaching into the active magic of it, and that would reveal far too much of his hand. "I never intend to ignore you, Prince William." 

"Will," he replies on reflex, blinking a moment before looking up properly. As Hannibal had been distracted by his thoughts, so Will had been distracted by the gentle motions of Hannibal's hands against the page. There is something both hypnotic and familiar about it, like the way someone would stroke another's hair. He blinks again.

"Just Will is fine."

People rarely use his title and his full name in the same address, some use one, the Queen uses the other, and not since he was a child has anyone called him Will. And he misses it. He offers a smile into the silence that follows.

"I've never been riding after dark. The forest isn't safe then, but I'm sure we could circle the castle perimeter for want to feel freedom for a change."

Thankfully Will doesn't have to be at the ceremony, though he knows all the details of it. He takes another drink from his cup and hums, eyes narrowing just a little as they meditate on the corner of the book in Hannibal's lap. His fingers spread then come together against the cup before he sets it down and he waits for his answer.

"Why wouldn't it be safe?" Hannibal asks, in clear curiosity. The brush had been thick, but beneath it the ground level, the trees friendly, the way more or less clear. So long as they did not crash through it at a gallop, there shouldn't have been anything to fear.

He hadn't missed the request - and it strikes Hannibal then that they have become surprisingly close without having to speak much about it. They seemed to work well - each could work around the other in silence. Hannibal's fingers go still when he realizes the motion they make is attracting attention, and he finally lifts his hand from the book and reaches for his drink again, before it goes utterly cold. He folds the book closed in his lap to prevent it from being an easy proxy, the cool soft pages under his fingertips a decent proxy for skin.

"There is little to fear in darkness that one does not bring with them," Hannibal suggests gently. "Unless there is some creature or curse...?" 

Will considers and shrugs, offering another smile. Perhaps it's a vestigial fear, stuck around from his youth when the darkness was scary and that fear impossible to ignore. He has no fear of the dark now, chooses to spend more of his time in it rather than light a lantern or warm by the fire. The thought of riding through the forest at night sounds exhilirating. He's prepared to spend the entire next day completely exhausted if he can share the experience.

"I'll be sure to leave my demons behind." he says after a while. The book in his lap is one of folk tales today, and Will strokes the dust off the cover before opening it and letting his eyes skim the contents. It's not a book he would have chosen for himself, he's grown out of such things, though he remembers enjoying them greatly when he had been a child. But something at the back of his mind lingers, makes him pause as he remembers Hannibal's words from a few days before, about books that demand to be read. And thinks back to the book he'd found on the stairs, the stubborn little volume that had refused to stay up as the others had, and had slid so far down as to be sure Will would not return it.

It lays on the floor of his room, along with the book he had selected, and suddenly he feels an almost painful urge to read it.

"Do you think," he asks after a moment, eyes still on the book in front of him, but now not focused on it. "That if you do not believe in a certain magic, it will not have a hold on you?"

In the meantime, Hannibal has settled the book he'd been reading back where he'd found it with a gentle pat that reassured it he would return later. He takes up the next volume that comes to hand, in the hopes that it will better hold his attention. They'll ride - he only has to endure an entire day more of preparations - and after that it promised to settle out. To become smoother.

Once the ladies of court become used to him, things will ease, his time will be his own again, at least in part. He is settling into an account of historic travels and the wonders seen when Will's question distracts him, and he considers the answer.

"I think it requires more understanding than simple denial to escape the hold of any magic," Hannibal allows, after a long moment of thought. His dark eyes lift from the page, and he makes eye contact. "Is there something you would like to escape?"

The question is an interesting one. William has potential, Hannibal suspects. The Queen likely took his father on because of the magic the man wielded, the same sort she suspected Hannibal of having, though he was careful to keep his effects as unobtrusive as possible. He isn't sure how much raw potential - it would be difficult to tell until his birthday, and the Queen's magic was usually so overpowering in the castle that it was hard to get a sense - a fact for which he was grateful. It hid some of his tampering. 

Will shakes his head before looking up too. He holds Hannibal's gaze a moment before swallowing lightly.

"I'm not sure - Perhaps all, perhaps none," Hannibal says, thinking on the notion, quietly noting that the question seemed relevant to the way he pulled the Queen's magic off the young man. He was becoming more aware, more alive and less a doll on strings. Even then he had retained much of himself, under magics that might have crushed a lesser soul. He was fascinating. 

"If denial were the key to escape, both of us would be much freer," he murmurs, letting his eyes slide down to Hannibal's lips a moment before looking away and letting the book decide which story it wants him to read today.

Hannibal laughs - not at the notion, it was elegant and true if blunt, but at the way the words come together. "Free as the birds, perhaps. Stating it that way does not make me feel much better about it. " 

The lanterns give soft glow to the entire room, a comfortable light that feels warm despite how cold the tower is. Will doubts it will ever be warm here, even in the height of summer. He settles more comfortably in his space, almost curled in on himself, and lets his eyes rest on the words in front of them but not take them in. He can feel Hannibal watch him, can feel that the man wants to say more, ask more perhaps, but he's refraining. It's not uncomfortable so much as intriguing, fascinating. Will wonders if he can get the man to open up by simply being patient.

The book in Hannibal's lap does not hold nearly as much fascination as the young man in front of him. He was, in a way, finally being allowed to blossom. Like a rose that had all of it's buds trimmed until finally someone took the shears from the fingers of the gardener. The Prince's eyes shine now, where the first night he had met Will, they had been dull - perhaps with wine, but Hannibal suspects that hadn't been all of it.

He was far more fascinating than his mother - the potential, the way he looked at the world, his strength... all interested Hannibal, but perhaps not so much as the way the eyes settled upon him with uncertain hunger. Hannibal should not encourage it - but he wants to. He lowers his eyes to his book and reads the same passage three times and thinks of looking out the window and seeing the black horse thundering out through the gate at full tilt with the rider in silhouette, gaining in power and presence - and the toxic way the Queen's magic began to feel when she learned that Will had been out. 

Finally he cannot sit and endure it - he gets to his feet at last and tucks the book against his side. It's better not to start down this path, he has some idea of where it will lead and there is danger for both of them there. He smiles anyway, turns his eyes on William in warm promise and suggests, "Tomorrow?" 

Will looks up, just a flick of his eyes from the position he's in, and for a long moment he doesn't answer. He just watches how the lantern-light makes the man seem taller, more imposing and also somehow softer. Will feels himself smile and then sits up a little more, fingers keeping his page.

"Tomorrow." he confirms, not moving to get up and follow the man out, though he does let his eyes linger as the man leaves, closes his eyes and lets his steps echo until they too are gone and the tower is quiet again. The books sit still and Will doesn't disturb them, staring at nothing in particular until he opens the book in his hand again and reads the story there, slowly, his eyelids growing heavy and sleepy as he gets nearer and nearer the end. He knows he needs to get to his chambers, still too scared to freeze up here if he were to just give in and sleep.

He barely remembers the story as he sets the book aside and puts the lanterns out. Something about a young maiden eating a poisoned apple and dying, being brought back to life with a kiss. It's a silly tale but Will feels strangely warm having read it. He makes his way down the stairs carefully and lets his legs walk him to his chambers without his mind's express command to do so.

There, he undresses slowly, sets his clothes aside and crawls between the sheets with a sigh.

He can see the books he'd brought down still lying where he'd left them, one partially open, the pages bending - something Will usually does not allow, he hates damaged books, feels a strangely aching empathy towards them - the other closed and tatty, a dirty, dusty thing that didn't do itself favors sliding down hundreds of steps to get under Will's feet. He considers for a moment that he should get up, take the book up and read it, but his mind is so fuzzy with exhaustion and intrusive, lightly inappropriate thoughts that he lets it lie for another night, confident he will gather it tomorrow.

-

The next day is a thinly veiled conspiracy to keep them apart. Not once during the day is Hannibal allowed a moment to himself, and before the purification ceremony, the Queen takes it upon herself to go and dote upon her adopted son, to check over all of his preparations and make gentle noises of approval, to touch and soothe him in a way she had not in many years. It leaves him feeling vague and sleepy, unwilling to wander again. 

Then there is the Ceremony, after which the Queen orchestrates a series of careful surprises for Hannibal that keeps him far later than anticipated, and he is tired when he makes it down to the stables and finds no one there but the steeds. He waits, with his hands in the mare's mane, and wonders if he has been forgotten. With the way the day has settled, it would come as no surprise

It is past midnight when he ascends the stairs into the tower and finds Will asleep, a book folded open on his lap like a pet, the pages fluttering over his hand like a soft caress and a heavy net of magic settled over him with an inelegance that sets Hannibal's teeth on edge.

All his work could lie undone, should he let this magic settle and stay until it was as comfortable and invisibly constricting as it had been before, but if he undoes it the work cannot seem to be so accidental - not with the bonds shining and new. The old ones might have faded and failed - especially so near to the Prince's coming of age, but not these.

He should leave them be - should have from the beginning except they had seemed strange and unnecessary. At least until after the wedding, he should not work to undo the Queen's magics in a way she will see. The bonds, however, anger him. They are needless, harmful, quieting things that disrupt something interesting and force it to compliance.

Hannibal crouches, and shakes Will awake, touching only as necessary to pull the fresh spellweaving off of him,and under the excuse of waking him. "I forgive your absence from our plans," he says, with a strange edge to his voice. "But you should not sleep up here in the chill." 

Will jerks awake, the book stilling in his hands, and blinks rapidly at Hannibal crouching near him. His words vaguely reach him and Will's lips part in surprise. He hadn't forgotten, not until the evening had settled and he'd found his feet guiding him up to the tower as they always did, and not to the stables as he himself had suggested.

"I'm sorry," he murmurs, bringing a hand up to rub his eyes. The entire day was a blur of vague sticky memories he doesn't quite want to see clearer. "I'm sorry, I... I did remember."

Guilt settles over him but not for sleeping here, it's something else that he can't place or explain, something that the tone in Hannibal's voice brought forth. He sits up a little, one hand behind him for support, the other still against his face as though rubbing his eyes will bring about clarity, and notices how close they are. He breathes, for just a moment doing nothing more, before swallowing lightly and shaking his head.

"Perhaps that's sound advice, I feel like I have a headcold." he offers an apologetic expression and wonders just how much more he can apologise before that look leaves Hannibal's face.

It's distraction, as Hannibal tugs the webs away from Will - the magic is sticky like spider's webs and were Hannibal anyone different it would have adhered to him in a telltale way, but instead he takes it in. It has always been his particular talent, to consume magic and make it his own. He is ever so careful about it, careful not to leave any trailing ends, before he stands and offers his hand down to Will.

"No need to be sorry. You look somewhat out of sorts, and I know your days have been at least as long as mine," Hannibal says, and the last of the fog seems to clear from Will's mind when the Prince curls his fingers around the offered hand and stands up. 

Hannibal's eyes grow warm again - some of it is the victory over the magic, but the rest of it is pleasure at the way Will's eyes go back to their clear cool color - not much had been undone, that was good. A relief. 

"Come downstairs, I'll see you to your room," he suggests, and folds his hands behind his back as the other finds his feet and the rest of his awareness. "You'll sleep better, though the books do seem to want to take care of you." 

The warmth lingers and Will finds himself unabe to do much but blink again, lips curving up just a little in less a smile and more a confused expression. He still regrets forgetting, but the smile is forgiveness enough. He finally lets his own mirror.

"Is it too late to ride now?" he asks, already knowing the answer. It's just cold enough in the tower to be the farthest point from day, the in the early morning where everything is still and silent and completely untouched. He glances back at the books and finds them still again, as though content to let Will go if it's Hannibal he's going with. He doesn't feel the tug to take one with him, so he doesn't force the issue, sure that whatever book wants his attention later will get it.

"It's well past midnight," Hannibal affirms, but he does not sound upset in the least. Instead he offers a quiet acceptance that it is what it is and suggests. "There will be other nights." 

They can't walk abreast on the stairs, so Will gestures for Hannibal to walk first, keeping perhaps two steps behind him as they descend. However long he's slept, it's refreshed him. Or perhaps it's the pleasant wake-up call that has his vision clear and hearing tuned to even the slightest sound. He can feel how his heart is pumping blood to every part of his body, keeping him alive, and it's such a strange sensation, one he is sure everyone takes for granted. If he could, he would run. Fast. Anywhere he could just to release the energy.

The life vibrates off of Will strong enough for Hannibal to feel it, and he's proud of his work. William would have slept likely well into the next day had Hannibal not pulled him free of the soothing glamour. It would have been a refreshing sleep, but a restricting one. He is sorry that they cannot still ride, but it's best that Hannibal gets at least a little rest - tomorrow will be the final day before the wedding.

By the time they reach the corridor it's barely passed, and Will gives Hannibal a smile before turning to lead them through the back corridors to the wing his chamber is in. It's strange knowing that in a day's time, the man won't need to be shown the way. It's also a feeling that settles in Will's gut and weighs there uncomfortably.

"I've never asked your opinion on the marriage," Hannibal seems to realize, as they traverse the hallways - the carpet here on the stone floor is thick, the tapestries carefully hung and of highest quality. He leaves his hands tucked behind his back, but his eyes take it in. It is as strange for him to think that tomorrow he will walk this with a wife, married in power and name to the Queen. "I suppose I was worried you'd consider it an intrusion." 

Will opens his mouth to reply but frowns, finding himself unsure on just how to. Does he find it an intrusion? Does he oppose it? He supposes he doesn't so many suitors have come to try and win his stepmother's hand that he's used to the process. But then, no one has ever made it as far as the Duke had. He pauses in the corridor a moment and turns back, head tilted a little in thought.

"Since my father died the Queen has not remarried. I've grown used to not having a father figure, I don't need one. But..." he takes a breath to continue and finds himself silent instead. But. But Hannibal doesn't feel like a father figure, a friend, perhaps, a companion, but not a father figure. perhaps because he didn't approach Will initially with the intent to be one for him, maybe once the wedding is final and complete the position will be filled as it should be, and the easy, comfortable company they have no will fade to something more appropriate.

Will finds himself very much saddened by the thought.

"I don't oppose the wedding, it's none of my business to. Nor, really, will it affect me once I come of age and can make my own way." he frowns a little, still unsure how to voice his confusion on the matter without it sounding inappropriate and intrusive in its own way.

Despite Will's rightful assertion that the wedding wasn't much his business, Hannibal is relieved by his acceptance of it anyway. The expression suggests there's more to it than that, that there is something more William has to say. Hannibal waits, though he knows his own objections at this point, to see what point is raised. 

"What is your opinion on it?" he asks finally, sure no one has actually asked the man before. He's had his life to himself for long enough to know it, to know how to work with it, surely he's thought this through. But from everything Will has read, from what he knows of others, people who are happy with a marriage do not spend their nights hiding in towers or spending their days escaping to do riding.

"I think it is best for both kingdom and duchy," Hannibal answers tactfully, his hands twisting invisibly behind his back. In truth - he feels he has been alone far too long. His solitary nature was beginning to attract attention of the wrong sort. Much as he found himself constantly at the mercy of the women of the court, he has had suitors as well. Eventually his hand would be forced. "I must not seem like it, but I am grateful to the Queen for her acceptance."

He considers the rest, and sighs. "I've grown used to self-sufficiency, and an abundance of privacy. And perhaps I expect that a man spoken for and gently dissuading might finally free himself of the attentions of various attending ladies in waiting." And he worried that spending too long amongst the various wards of the Queen would tempt him to do more shaking and twisting of her magic than he had already done with Will - a big enough risk to his plans already. 

"Besides," he says, under the guise of humor a grain of truth. "I would be wiser not to displease the Queen, now that she has so inclined her heart." 

Will offers a smile in return, a crooked, easy thing, before letting his eyes slip away and down again to the floor. After a moment he swallows gently and turns to keep walking, hearing Hannibal follow after a brief pause to give him a respectful amount of space to gether himself.

"I remember," he says, breaking the silence again as they reach his door and stop, "When I was small and my father took me to the village, many people told me they wanted my life. Not cruelly, mostly in jest, but there was a small hint of truth in their words. They wanted what I had. And I've always wondered why." he looks up and presses his lips together gently before licking them in preparation to speak again. "Few people realize just how restricting this life is. How ironic it is that the most powerful in a nation are also the most controlled. By duties and honor. It's exhausting."

He wonders if he misspoke, said too much. But he wants Hannibal to know that in a way he understands, that although the acceptance is welcomed from the Queen, her interest is not. At least, not in the capacity she gives it. Will wonders if Hannibal ever looks at the Queen like he looks at him, with that soft look and easy smile, the way his eyes crinkle at the corners just enough to know, even if the rest of his expression is impassive, that he is amused.

"Thank you," he says after a while, "For escorting me to my door." and there's an underlying amusement there, a teasing. Not quite bait.

Briefly, almost visibly, Hannibal entertains the idea of escorting the Prince past his door. He smiles instead. "Hardly an adventure for the storybooks," he agrees, of the situation. It was a delicate one. "Nor even the one I intended."

There is time enough - in fact more time than he will eventually know what to do with. The Queen will hopefully eventually stop trying to bind him quite so fiercely to her side - but what she will do about Will, he isn't sure. Nor, in fact, if she will know instantly of his interference and challenge him on it. Perhaps the wedding will distract her enough to give him a chance to plan for it. 

He hesitates, on the verge, and then settles back from anything decisive. Instead he simply inclines his head gently, and lets his gaze linger. "Good night, Will. Dream well."

Perhaps in their dreams they will have the ride they missed - if Hannibal can find it in him to sleep. At the moment, he is tired - but he is also engaged. He knows that when the world is quiet and dark around him in the strange room he has been given as his own - for this last night anyway - that his mind will turn against him and keep him awake.

Will returns the sentiment and eases the door open just enough to let himself through it. His room is cool but not freezing, far from the temperature in the tower. He rests his back against the door long enough for his shoulders to ache before pushing away and entering the room properly, pulling off his boots - hopping rather ungracefully onone foot as the other boot catches - and falling into bed with enough momentum to bounce. Then he rests, arms splayed out and eyes on the ceiling. He's too awake to sleep properly now, still too alive in a way he hasn't felt before, and he turns his head enough to see the books on his floor before making up his mind to finally take them up.

He gets out of bed to light a candle, certain that with just two books near it it will stay lit, and collects the books carefully from the floor, easing the pages back to lie flat in the book that had fallen in his careless toss. He sets that one aside, finding the spine too hard to bend to open the book further, and picks up the other. It's bound and leather, and old enough for the corners to crumble in his fingers and disappear into a fine dust before it even hits the sheets. Will pauses, waits for the book to settle, and opens it at the beginning.

Unlike most, it is hand written, dated at the top with a date so obscure Will can't quite bring up a mental image of the time mentioned. A journal.

In his entire time exploring the book tower, he has never come across a journal before. The tower stores old books and rare books, books that don't fit into the library or simply don't fit in there, but he has never seen something like this. The handwriting is sloped and hard to read at first, too close together, a product of unending practice, lessons drilled over and over into the person's hand with a harsh rap to the knuckles until it was second nature. It takes Will perhaps two pages to let his eyes adjust to the penmanship and to let his mind understand the words.

It's a simple thing, a journal of someone's life. Fascinating in just how dull it is. Describing the goings on in a village - perhaps their village, the one Will can see from his window if he leans out far enough to see past the wall - in a family that is well enough off to send their son to be educated. There are no names, no particular details that give away a place or event, and Will finds himself drawn into this man's life as he would be into any story. The ink is dark and dusty with age, certain words lighter than others where the pigment has faded. It's perhaps halfway through the book that the color of it changes to a dull maroon, a color of ink Will has never seen before.

By this point the candle has burned low, the work to light the page taken over by the dawn outside the window. In the journal, four years have elapsed, and Will has been with his narrator throughout, enthralled and present, curious.

He turns a page and finds the handwriting to have changed, still the same person but it's messier, harsher, and takes a long time to decipher now that Will's eyes have grown used to the looped writing of before. He frowns at the page, leans closer to see it better...

...and nearly drops the book when there's a knock on his door.

"Sire,"

Will sighs, lips pursed and heart hammering. He clears his throat and makes a sound implying he's heard.

"Sire, her majesty wishes to see you before the morning preparations can begin for the ceremony. She asks with urgency, my lord, I would advise you hurry."

Will rubs his eyes and closes them, the book heavy in his hand but still, sure this is the page it wants Will to stay on.

"I will be there presently," he says, aiming his voice towards the door. He hears the man shuffle away with his answer, and falls back against the pillows behind him, back realigning after hours of sitting bent over the book in his hands. He groans at the feeling, sets the book aside and stretches properly, deliciously, before lying pliant.

It takes him a moment of just lying and staring at the ceiling before he sits up, blows out the candle, and leaves his room, the book open on the page he's left it, waiting for him to return.

-

Hannibal has not slept. But there is a sort of nervous tension that carries the Duke through the day, through the attention of his servants. He does not feel particularly well inclined even toward the ones he brought with him, but he manages to sit still through their preparations. Through the dressing and redressing, through the laborious process they go through for his hair - which is then usurped when the court ladies invade his space at a far earlier hour than agreed.

Ostensibly, they do so to be sure he makes no attempt to do anything unlucky - and they deem a lot of things unlucky. By the end he is certain that he looks fairly ridiculous, and it is only with a judicial self-reminder that the ceremony is certainly more for the Queen and her people that he endures the white and blue flowers at his lapel and ludicrously tucked into the elaborately tied ponytail. They touch him more than is strictly necessary, and he endures, and wonders perhaps if at any point his horse has felt like this when he has groomed her to gleaming perfection.

It's possible she's never felt as much like biting anyone as he did by the time they released him, unfed and hungry (bad luck to eat before the wedding, he is assured) into the whole ordeal.

The ceremony itself is grand and sculpted, carefully arranged to the Queen's every specification. It is outdoors, with citizens of the kingdom crowded in to have their first glimpse of their Queen's new foreign consort, and for all intents, Hannibal projects a calm happiness into the endeavor, and he does not let his eyes stray once. It pleases the Queen, it pleases the people, and he feels accomplished when the Queen is so enamored and obviously joyful she takes enough wine to stand on his feet during their last dance of the evening - barefoot and smiling in a way that makes her seem younger, happier. More allowing. For that moment, he forgets how she uses her magic.

But when he feels it settle hot and sticky on his shoulders over the spun silk cloak that drapes like liquid midnight over his shoulders and tug him toward the stairs, inexorably toward her will, he recalls. It pushes him the wrong way, but he does not brush it off, gives no sign that the overly amorous suggestion would have been unnecessary had she not made it, and that now that she had it had spoiled his attitude. 

He guides her up the stairs, but his eyes are distant - until they pass William, in his wedding finest - dressed darkly and demurely in long lines that have attracted many more eyes than his this evening - and the court ladies have someone else to fuss over at least. Hannibal does not dare smile, but his eyes warm briefly - sympathetically. He would help the other disentangle if he could. Absently, he reaches up to his hair and pulls the blue rose the ladies had bound into it, the frothy spray of white tiny baby's breath still attached, and leaves it on the stairs in his passing. He forgoes the urge to step upon it, and then he and the Queen are gone. 

At least until she sleeps and he can slide free of the hold her magic has on him. At least that long. 

Will fiddles with the rose so much the stem becomes soft, bending under the weight of the bud until he just rests it in his palm. The ceremony had been beautiful, perfectly executed, and, if he didn't know any better, both bride and groom looked very happy with the outcome. He tries not to think too much on how warm he'd felt when Hannibal finally looked at him, when he'd smiled in that gentle way where only his eyes showed it, and then passed. He had gotten out of the post-wedding celebrations - surprisingly not easy, now that the ladies in waiting had lost Hannibal as their subject of attention - and made his way back to his chambers. But there he found nothing more than the book he'd left open and an empty cool bed.

He went to the stables next, taking his time to brush and interact with Winston until the horse gently but firmly nosed him out of his stall, tired of the attention and wanting to curl up in sleep. Will offered a treat to Hannibal's mare and scratched under her chin lightly before returning to the castle, bypassing the grand hall and making his way down to the kitchen to get something to eat. 

The staff have always been kind to him here, he has never given them a reason not to be; his father had taught him well about respecting others and not allowing something so fickle as status interfere with being gracious and helpful. He manages to eat a very filling meal in the company of the cook and some of the maids, and leaves the kitchen in much better spirits than he'd entered it. Though, once he hits the corridor to his chambers - and the Queen's, and Hannibal's now - his good mood fades again.

He doesn't move to go to the tower, he knows Hannibal won't be there and the effort will be wasted since he has no need for a new book. He fiddles with the rose some more, unfolding some of the outer petals and letting them slowly fall back to the way the want to lay. He doesn't let his mind linger on the strange feeling in his gut that makes him feel a little sick. The castle's gone quiet by the time he realizes it's envy. Pure, selfish envy that he will no longer have the easy banter and company he shared with Hannibal before the wedding. He berates himself for the stupidity - he's known the man a week - and leaves his room again, intending on spending the night elsewhere, perhaps explore another tower to take his mind off the events of the day and the sinking feeling in his stomach.

He's too preoccupied with the flower in his hand to notice that someone else is in the hallway until he very nearly walks into them. He jerks up, stepping aside and leaning against the tapestry as he blinks and frowns, tongue pressing against his lower lip in thought until he lets it go.

"I'm not even sure what title to address you by now," he says finally, taking in the exhausted and thoroughly drunk shape of Hannibal in front of him. He offers an amused smile and tilts his head, giving the man the chance to answer or pass him by.

"At this exact second," the Duke allows, leaning heavily against the wall to brace himself up, "I hardly believe I deserve one."

Still, his eyes trail down to the rose in Will's hands, and he supposes it could be any rose at all, but he knows better, and the thought turns over and over clumsily in his mind, lodging and sticking and then twitching over. It makes him feel less oily, less covered in the sticky remainder of magic that he knows he has left behind but that he still feels like the phantom touch of fingers pressed into his skin.

He has clearly done this to himself - when he'd left the party he had been clear eyed and straight backed, but here in the hallway he pushes his back into the wall as if that could keep his vision from spinning, the gyroscope of his mind still. The world slides left and jerks back for Hannibal, lazy and slow and still dizzying, and it's still a better feeling, quieter, than what he'd had trying to make himself be still laying next to the Queen, near enough to smell the wine on her own breath. 

"You're still awake?" He asks, curious - it seemed he wasn't the only one with thoughts that had gone so far and so fast round and round on themselves that he'd sought to smash them flat under the hammer of intoxication. Hannibal finds himself looking into the cool, clear eyes, watching the curve of amusement take shape on the well formed mouth, and he knows there is nothing subtle about it - nor is there anything remotely appropriate.

"I'm no fit company, Will," he apologizes, and settles down, sliding down the wall to sit heavily against it, stable on two sides now but still almost swaying. He keeps his eyes carefully away, though they still stray to the rose petals under soft fingers, to the motions they make like his own had made against the soft book paper. 

“No worse than I was when we first met,” Will suggests, watching Hannibal make himself comfortable on the floor and not missing the way his eyes travel back to him, linger. With the fog of alcohol, Hannibal’s usual control seemed to waver and Will finds himself fascinated. He stands over him a moment, to the side, before taking the one step necessary to stand in front of him and sink down to join him on the ground.

He gives Hannibal a genuine smile and cocks his head to the side.

“It was a beautiful ceremony. Did the celebrations continue outside the grand hall?” it’s meant in jest, but there is an underlying tone of jealousy, of a strange sort of sadness that Will really doesn’t want to think on. “From the way you’re walking, and the direction, it’s likely they continued for you alone.”

"Ah," Hannibal allows himself to look faintly chastised. He knows where he should be for certain, and what duties he should be doing, when both parties are capable and sober enough to do them. It isn't the sort of thing that should be delayed. "The Queen is asleep. She..."

It's not much excuse for his current state, but he finds it difficult to put into words exactly how infringed upon he felt. The magic she had slid over him had ruined any desire he had felt for her, had felt in fact like a sticky, slimy thing trying to war with his own emotions and transform him to her will. She did not even ask - to be fair, neither did he, when he broke down her work or shook it loose. 

Will watches Hannibal carefully, takes in his eyes – dark though completely unfocused with the alcohol – the way his movements have shifted from precise to lazy, slow, still graceful as ever. Without thinking much on it, Will leans forward to set the rose behind Hannibal’s ear, at an angle high enough to not impair vision, and lets his fingers linger on the skin near his eye before pulling away. 

Hannibal does not protest. He allows himself to be flowered again, though the thought amuses him, the warm skim of skin on skin near his temple catches his attention even through the fog of intoxication. He moves vaguely as Will pulls back, as if to catch his hand, but he is nowhere near co-ordinated enough, and the movement dies before it can complete.

From the stillness, the silence, Will knows he should get up and leave. Knows he should have when he’d seen Hannibal in the first place; the man is so inebriated Will doubts he’ll remember much of this in the morning - in a few hours. And yet he doesn’t. Wants to see what Hannibal looks like when his iron control is muted. 

“You looked happy today.” He says quietly.

Hannibal summons a smile in response. "I was as happy as I should have been," he suggests, still careful even now not to imply that the heavier this settled upon him the less he wanted it. "The kingdom should see happiness at a wedding like this, and for a time I believe the Queen was happy too."

He sighs, lifts his hand to the flower behind his ear. "What is the fascination...?" He asks, and he can feel the soft stem, the loose petals, but he leaves it be. If he takes it into his hands he will pull it apart. "You looked happy too."

“I was as happy as I should have been.” Will replies, verbatim. His smile is only a little bigger. He can feel his heart pounding like it had been only a day ago – was it a day? – when Hannibal had found him in the tower, asleep so deeply he could have been dead. When he’d woken him up and escorted him downstairs.

“The fascination is that it suits.” He adds after a moment, very much amused by the way Hannibal both wants to tug the rose free and how much he refrains. He licks his lips lightly and just watches. Unsure of what he wants, of what this means, knowing he should get up and escort Hannibal to his chambers as the man had so thoughtfully done for him. and leave him there, at the door, perhaps stay long enough to watch him go in.

He tilts his head a little, watches Hannibal’s eyes track the movement. Licks his lips again and observes the same. And it’s exciting, this attention, this captivation. From no one else, it seems, but the person Will should not enjoy it from. He takes a breath and lets it out, eyes on Hannibal as the others are, unerringly, on him.

“What is your fascination?” he asks finally, curious.

Ah, caught. Hannibal pulls his lower lip from between his teeth, where they had been scraping slowly over, for any sensation at all. He makes a sound of amused apology, when it is clear he has been staring. He should not have allowed himself to drink so much - in truth he had intended only one glass, but it had gone down so easily that he had let the rest of the bottle follow.

"A dangerous thing," he answers, truthfully. He should still his appreciation for the Prince now, sever it down to something far more appropriate - but William was interesting, bright...and very handsome, if Hannibal allowed himself. He should not, but he does, at least the once. There is a moment where the quiet that follows becomes charged, as he wants, just once, to act on his desires and show Will exactly what has fascinated him. He does not worry that his interest isn't returned.

Instead he puts both his palms on his knees, pushes his back into the wall, and works on getting himself to his feet - the only way to break this slow moving attraction, this pull of gravity, is to stand, to get moving, so he does- slowly.

Will watches him stand, feels the tension ease, bend and stretch to something manageable, but doesn’t yet follow him up. He watches from where he is, the way Hannibal straightens, keeps lending the wall his balance as he tries to gather himself. And Will knows that if he just lets him be, if he excuses himself and wishes the man a pleasant night that this will be forgotten. After a few days, perhaps weeks, but it will pass by as though it never was.

But he can feel the envy, the feeling that had clawed at him in his room now tightening around his lungs. If he doesn’t say something now, it will pass in theory, but the feeling will still be there, grow rabid.

Or pass. As Will grows and leaves the kingdom and takes his life for himself. It could pass. It would.

And it’s that, perhaps, that has Will scrambling up to join Hannibal standing, to face him. He doesn’t move more. Doesn’t move to push or pull the man either way, just watches him, tries to gauge, in his stupid inexperience, how far to push.

Hannibal could let this slip by, but the way Will scrambles up after him to his feet, which brings him into easy, overly close proximity just on the barest edge of appropriate. He goes still instead, surrendering to inertia. 

"There is little to fear in darkness that one does not bring with them," Will says, pressing his lips together gently. “Danger is relative.”

He takes a breath, just one, to say more and decides not to. He licks his lips instead and nods.

“Good night, Hannibal.”

The reach is instinctive, the failure to stop himself from completing the motion is a conscious decision. It was the soft motion of the man's tongue against his lower lip - the third time in as many minutes suggesting his hunger as clear as Hannibal muted his own. His fingers hook into Will's vest, rather than make any solid attempt to grip - he is too uncoordinated.

"Good night," Hannibal answers, as he pulls William forward, as he leans into it himself - but just as their lips brush, he remembers himself, remembers where he is and what he's become and leaves it at that, draws back apologetically. 

"Perhaps I have brought something dark with me," he allows, and pushes his palm flat and gentle against Will's chest before he takes his hand away, a soft motion. Then he gets moving, back for the room he shares with the Queen, back to sleep where he should be sleeping so he does not wind up some place he should most certainly not be.

Will just stands. For a long time he just stands still and holds his breath and then the door closes behind Hannibal and he jerks as though burned. It had been nothing. Less than. A gentle tug and a shared breath and nothing else but when he breathes again Will’s breath is shallow. He swallows, licks his lips, does it again, and backs away until his back hits the wall opposite, the one that if he follows it will lead to his door, eventually.

So he does.

From there it’s fumbling. Uncoordinated and graceless, and Will falls to the bed, wriggling out of his pants before he lets one hand move to stroke himself, shirt still loose against his chest and Will far too gone to care to remove it. It will be a quick relief, something done and forgotten and left behind, so Will slows his hand, forces himself to enjoy it. If that’s the closest he will get then he will enjoy it. Reluctantly, he pulls his hand away.

Will parts his lips and imagines Hannibal’s mirroring… no. No it would be the opposite, his own would be pressed apart with a gentle pressure, perhaps outlined by just the tip of tongue. They part wider as his eyes slip closed, and it’s easy to imagine now, with the smell of the man still so close, the tug against his clothing replaying over and over until he brings up a hand to do it again, a little harsher though, curls his fingers in the fabric and pulls until his back arches off the bed and his other hand slides low over his stomach.

It had been such an easy movement, Hannibal’s hand against him, the way his head tilted just so, the way it could have been deeper, so much more, if Will had just pushed up, let their mouths slot together and allow the movement, vindicate it. but he hadn’t.

So he does now, letting his hand slide palm-flat from head to base, fingers curling gently at the end to get a soft but comfortable grip. He gasps quietly and the hand curled in his shirt lowers to rest against his chest, fabric crinkled in his fist. Will starts a rhythm, a slow tug and press against fevered, dark skin until he’s turning his head away to pant quietly into the sheets, imagining that a clever mouth follows, drags lips down his jaw and to his neck, smiling against his skin as Will’s cheeks darken, murmuring something gentle as Will’s hand speeds up and curls, twisting lightly on the upstroke until his gasps become whimpers.

He imagines that when he draws his knees up and parts them, that Hannibal’s warm hands are the cause, that when he bites his lip and tenses, that there’s the familiar soft voice, the laugh that’s almost too quiet to hear, telling him to wait, and hold out just a little more so Hannibal can see him like this. And Will does. Spread open and vulnerable, caught up in his fantasy enough to forget that he’s alone, that he can stop or cum as he pleases. He tugs his free hand away, pulling his shirt to bunch just under his chin before he lets it go, stretches his hand up above him to find purchase, to find grounding, and then it’s over. With a low moan and bitten-red lips, Will comes, shaking and exhausted, the stone walls of his chamber swallowing up his cries.

It takes a moment to recover, for Will to swallow air and turn to the side and just rest. Eyes hooded and lids heavy, tongue seeking out the gentle marks he’d bitten into his lips in an effort to stay quiet. He grins, languid and slow, and pulls his shirt the rest of the way off, wiping himself clean before turning to lie on his stomach, pillow gathered under his chin so he can bury his face in it.

This was trouble. Dangerous, dangerous trouble.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will takes up the challenge to suffer and cause suffering... and it ends well for them both.
> 
> This is basically PWP, but - magically, because this is a fairytale after all - there is a lot of important plot development happening in the background.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is coming to you a day early as both the writers will be busy the evening this is due to be posted. And we decided it would be kinder to post early than to make you wait a few more days. Enjoy!~

The wedding celebration lasts three days for the people, though after the actual ceremony the celebrations themselves are simpler. On the first night, there are a thousand candles scattered through the castle, left lit and twinkling like stars, and in the village every window has a light to echo, making the land below appear like the sky above, velvety and soft with the light of stars.

On the second night afterward, a thousand paper birds take to the sky, and after them fly the white ravens from the ceremony, some with messages tied to their legs to carry the news. By that time, Hannibal has finally recovered, and the Queen has restored herself to her former dignity and grace. There is a smugness to her at her new acquisition, and she has occasionally insisted on Grand Duchess as a title, when dealing in matters of the unification of kingdoms. 

She has found the matters amusing, and Hannibal has turned most of them over to her, signing or asking for clarification on certain points as he was required. She seems content to maintain separate capitols, which means that at some point he will be bound to return to his own. Likely when she loses interest in her Husband as more than a political tool, if that happens. It seems possible - she does not seem to have the same emotion for Hannibal that she had shared with the Prince's father.

If, very late that evening, Hannibal has finally found some space to breathe and a chance to go down to the stables, where he finds one of the white birds lingering, he enjoys the chance for his space. He charms the bird as easily as he had the ladies of court, now thoroughly satisfied that the Queen was a lucky creature who fully enjoyed her Husband, and with the barrier of the ring on his finger, they seemed finally content to let him be and find other focuses for his attention. He does not need so much tolerance for the bird, just a kind word and some crumbs.

He has not seen Will since the night of the wedding, and he only vaguely remembers how they had encountered each other in the hall, after his lapse of judgment. He feeds the raven scraps from his fingers, finding the white bird with dark eyes fascinating to watch, as he tries to sort out the reason for the guilt that accompanies his thoughts of the Prince. He knows his thoughts about Will are less than wholly virtuous, but his fascination could be made tame to hand. 

He could bend his own interest down into something acceptable. The raven parades back and forth on the low wall of the open end of the stable, watching him with alert, quizzical eyes, and occasionally stooping to take food from his fingers. Behind him, his mare snorts impatiently, jealous that his attention (and treats) are being awarded elsewhere.

"I'm sorry dear," he lifts his voice without looking back. "Ravens are prophets, you know." He finally glances over his shoulder, and finds her with her neck stretched over the stall door and her ears forward and impatient, attention trained directly on him. "And making one fat will not stretch my saddle."

“And what prophecies does it tell you?”

"Thusfar only that there will be a time of plenty for white ravens," Hannibal answers, though he doesn't quite startle at the presence. It was only natural for Will to be here, given how much he had taken to Hannibal's particular version of escape. Winston reacts much as his mare did, his head sliding into view over the top of his stall door at the sound of Will's voice. The raven lunges for the scrap in his fingers and pinches skin in his beak, and Hannibal lets the bird have it. "And perhaps that indulgences will injure me," he adds, shaking the sting from his fingers in good nature. The raven takes wing. 

Will hadn’t seen Hannibal since the night in the corridor either, but it’s been less his desire to avoid him and more Hannibal’s duties keeping him away. He’d participated in the ceremonies appropriately, and let his mind drift in any way but. In the days they’d been avoiding each other – if that’s the right word, missing, perhaps – Will had explored every tower, had ridden Winston to the edges of the forest and around it until the animal was panting and pawing at the ground for rest. He had lain awake nights but has found himself refreshed in the mornings.

He smiles when Hannibal turns to look at him, a slowly spreading thing that widens just enough to show teeth before he leaves it to be a naturally amused expression and walks a little closer to pick up the brush for Winston. The horse snorts and nuzzles into Will’s hand when he pats him before he opens the stall door and steps in enough to lead him out.

“And you could always get a new saddle.”

"What sort of picture would that present," Hannibal muses. "A newly made king on a horse so fat as to waddle." 

When he approaches the mare, he offers her a treat anyway, and she accepts it as if it is her due, and he is too long in paying it, and he chuckles, swinging the stall door open to let her out. The understanding is that they will ride, now that they have chanced against each other again in the evening. 

Hannibal pauses to watch Will and his rapport with the horse he had brought. Winston had already forgotten Hannibal it seemed, the big, sleek animal paid attention solely to the Prince, as it should have been. They were a set, with wavy dark locks and a good understanding of each other. Hannibal is pleased with the image.

"You didn't take cold from your night in the tower?" Hannibal asks at last, when a warm nose pushes the back of his neck impatiently, and he takes up the comb to see to the mare's mane and tail, the brush to see to her coat. Hannibal feels more refreshed by the notion of riding than he has even when he finally managed a full night's sleep with the Queen next to him, breathing and existing.

“I didn’t,” Will confirms, brushing his horse enough to make the coat shine but not enough for it to be full care. “Thanks to your timely intervention.”

The horse noses against Will’s sleeves seeking more treats and Will gently pushes his nose away with a smile, brushing his mane over his eyes until the horse shakes it free.

“You didn’t suffer too bad a headache after your evening of festivities?” he asks in turn, keeping his tone neutral. He saddles Winston without asking if Hannibal will join him for the ride, he’ll certainly go without the Duke, but he would prefer the company. He doesn’t mention that he slept very well after his indulgence, doesn’t mention anything else at all. But perhaps the way he’s moving, the way he lets his body remain open, comfortable, is clue enough.

As he lifts the saddle over his mare's back, Hannibal hesitates - there is something in the tone that sounds calculated. Unusual for Will - and a heat to the words too, that Hannibal can almost taste. He settles the saddle over the thick blanket and settles it properly in place. "I suffered," he says, and smiles a little. "As I deserved, I suppose. Not much more than that. I apologize for the imposition of my company while I was impaired."

The night is quiet, too late for anyone to simply be out in it, and too early for the morning birds to wake. Will has found that he prefers this time of night to any other, where he can don a cloak and blend with the raven-black of his horse and fade into the night in silence. He adjusts the bridle so Winston is comfortable, scratches behind his ears and meets Hannibal’s eyes over the animal’s head.

“Shall we ride to the lake or farther?” he asks.

Hannibal draws a deep breath and sighs, considering. He should return early - he should be there next to the Queen when she wakes, as he has the last three nights, but he has not ridden since before the wedding and he is restive as his horse. "Far as we can," he says, and meets Will's gaze, feels the charge leveled his way by it, and wonders what he had begun in that hallway, when he had not quite revealed the whole of his hand in the matter of his interest in the Prince.

He leads the mare out of the barn, flicking the reins up onto her neck as he moves to open the hunter's gate for them - at this hour, no one is about to do it for them. "Only what we bring with us into the dark," Hannibal muses as he swings up into the saddle, and from somewhere above on the walls comes the harsh cackle of the Raven, laughing perhaps at how poorly they lie to themselves.

Will follows Hannibal out, clicking his tongue to make Winston follow without him having to lead him, and closes the gate behind them. When he mounts, he sits almost as tall as Hannibal, and he takes up the reins in gloved hands and gives him a sidelong look before casting his eyes to the forest.

“Far as we can,” he repeats, and he grins, barely holding in a loud whistle to set them on their way, it would defeat the purpose of escaping unseen for however long they have. Instead he sets Winston to a slow trot, directing his horse to the north, and keeps the gentle pace until they’re far enough out to not be seen from the towers, night cloaking them appropriately, and then he lets his horse run.

It’s just as exhilarating now as the first time. The speed this horse can get, the way it almost seems to fly over the ground instead of run on it, it’s freeing and empowering and Will feels himself laugh into the cool night the further they get from the castle. It’s a playful race, with one or the other taking the lead long enough for the second to give chase before easing back to ride together. Where they’re going isn’t important, to Will or Hannibal, as long as they get far enough to feel free, if for a moment.

They ride an hour perhaps before their steeds slow to a brisk walk, panting clouds of breath into the night as their riders relax in their saddles and take in the silence around them. The sky is clear, cold and empty of all but stars, and Will leans back to see as much of the sky as he can.

“We’ll hit a swamp if we go further,” he murmurs after a while, his voice hushed against the heavy silence, despite no one being around to hear them even if they yelled, “Just past the first row of trees.” He isn’t sure why it matters, he supposes they have to stop eventually for the horses to rest and for themselves to stretch after the ride.

He doesn’t suppose more, but he can feel his heartbeat pick up again, the same way it had in the corridor when he’d stood. Anticipation. Nervousness. Hope, perhaps.

"Have we come so far?" Hannibal asks, faintly surprised. The horse is warm, but she is walking out nicely, and he leaves the reins looped over the pommel of his saddle, directing with cues from his seat when he needs to. For the most part, he lets his horse follow Winston without interference. He has seen maps of the territory - this is a new direction, one that he has not ridden in before. 

But he can smell the damp and threatening of soft soil, and so he stays along the tree line rather than risking a thrown shoe or bogged down horse. He looks left and right, and his mare comes to a standstill and drops her head, sensing the ease in her rider, in the situation. "How far does it go on for?"

He reaches down to soothe along her neck, looking in amongst the trees before he turns his attention to Will - the Prince wore a dark cloak that lay from his shoulders down over Winston's rump, blending them almost seamless against the shadows behind. Hannibal is much more evident on his light mottled horse, with the crisp white of his sleeves and collar visible around his vest.

“Miles.” Will replies, ducking his head before turning it to Hannibal with a smile, “It’s considered the bounds of our land since no one’s ventured through it far enough to tell where it ends.” He turns his head back to the silent line of trees and sits back, preparing to dismount.

From here, the forest looks like any other in the area - hardwoods and pines intermingling without any care for segregating themselves. Within, it would be nearly black. Dark enough to hide the darkness of any transgressions. Hannibal swings down from his horse, feeling the pull of it, and leaves her to graze.

Will follows, pausing long enough to rest his head against Winston’s neck before the horse tugs away to graze as well. It’s silent here beyond the natural sounds the forest offers. The moon is high enough to see by, though not full enough to bring very good illumination. Will’s eyes have adjusted to the dark well enough to follow Hannibal though, and he is sure-footed and quiet as he does so.

The cloak is long enough to trail the ground as he walks, whispering over the grass and covering the sound of his footfalls. There is something beautiful watching the man in front of him move, something coiled and wild, almost predatory if Will didn’t trust him so much, and that alone makes him worry. For all he knows, the man could kill him. Unlikely Will is a danger to the man’s position, but he is someone who could get very difficult were certain things to not progress a certain way.

Will doubts he’ll hold it against Hannibal if all they do is spend the night staring at the stars in silence, it will be a cue that was given and rejected, and Will has enough respect for him to never touch the topic again were that the case. And still, he hopes it’s not.

They go just beyond the first few trees, where the ground gets soft but not treacherous. 

Here, there is an old magic - the place is haunted by it, compelling and sweet like a sad melody lingering trapped in a musical box until long after the maker had died. Yet Hannibal moves surely, even where there is actual danger - the ground grows soft beneath his feet but never so much as to pull him down. There is the softer pull of compulsion beneath it, as they move deeper - William seeming to understand to step exactly as Hannibal does amongst the shallow seeming pools and threatening bogs. 

It is a natural magic, not the rough crudities that man tended to wrest the fabric around them into. Like the tug of a line insinuated somewhere behind his heart. Hannibal pauses, twists the line in his magical grip like a man winding the business end of a whip around his arm to drag the wielder in close, and he pulls in return, gently, reeling in whatever was on the other end of the line.

"On the night of the wedding," he says, speaking to distract Will - though it is so dark here beneath the trees it's unlikely the other will notice any expression his efforts write on his features. Speaking might give him an excuse to look so distracted. "The Queen laid a compulsion on me."

It feels a little like confession. Whatever it is he's pulling toward them flutters on the end of the line as it realizes the pull, and he loosens his hold just a little, enough to soothe its fight, before he begins to draw it again. "It should have felt harmless - should have been harmless, but I could not stop myself from fighting it." 

In the dark, his eyes go toward the darker patch that is William, cloaked as heavily as he is in the blackness, and he wonders if the man wasn't beginning to develop his own magic, or had just dressed well. In the distance, a tiny, yellow flame moves toward them through the trees.

Will listens, standing silent and still as Hannibal speaks, eyes on him even though the man doesn’t turn to look at him for some time. His voice is soft, but there’s something there that resonates, something powerful without even trying and Will finds himself swallowing lightly. It’s not fear, the power isn’t aimed at him, but it’s there, and it’s something that Will hadn’t expected of the man. As lawful and common as magic was, he had only ever known his stepmother to be such.

“You seem to have an insatiable hunger to be free,” he murmurs instead. Behind them, the horses are silent. Perhaps used to Hannibal radiating such power, and Will turns his head back just enough to check that they’re still grazing. He sees only a flick of gray tail before the mare calmly walks past the clearing he can see, in search of new, sweeter grass. Will licks his bottom lip into his mouth and turns back, mouth gently falling open at the light he can see.

“Why are you telling me?” he asks.

The light changes as he pulls it closer, sliding through the spectrum of yellow to green, flickering, dancing, ever moving. It is the sort of light one should always see receding, so the steady approach, the steady way Hannibal pulls it toward them as if inverting a basic principal of the world is vaguely unsettling.

"As an explanation, perhaps," Hannibal answers, eyes leaving will and going toward the light, now nearing blue, pulsing, growing closer. "For my behavior that night. An apology."

He pulls again, and the creature finally becomes clear - the glow is so bright it's hard to make it out, in the center of a nearly perfect circle of flickering light moves a small creature, vaguely animal shaped - two pointed ears, four delicate, glowing limbs, a long, thick tail. Hannibal extends his hand, and pulls the creature toward him, and it settles like a bird tethered to a glove. A foxfire - will of the wisp, and the compulsion to follow it raises in both of them, though Hannibal soothes it down with his own magic. "And because I believe she compels you, as well." 

Will steps closer without realizing when Hannibal gently holds the little creature. It's beautiful and shy, turning to hide behind its tail and seeming to fade right through it to return to facing them. It's not in pain but clearly unused to such attention. 

Will wants to disagree, wants to reassure that there is nothing to apologize for. But it's his next words that keep Will quiet and confused. He has never felt controlled, though that was the idea of a compulsion, invisible and addictive and dangerous. He thinks of the way he'd slept in the tower, but shakes his head nonetheless. 

"I doubt she can compel either of us here," he says quietly, letting his eyes go to Hannibal in the light the little wisp exudes. He bites the inside of his lip lightly. They're very close, and outside the ring of light he can see nothing.

"I wish you'd not hesitated," he confesses quietly, "And the thought alone should not bring me here, should keep me in my room where my thoughts won't impact anyone's life but my own." He sighs, "I don't believe that you compelled me to be here. And by my own will I don't want to go."

The Foxfire has the sort of subtle magic that is so compelling to Hannibal, that is attractive and alluring and he desires to possess it - but not destroy it by owning it. It is the sort of magic he emulates. He lifts the creature to his eye level, and gives it a faint warning in his foreign language - perhaps that of the fae, or perhaps just the one he is more comfortable expressing his intent with. The meaning is clear 'don't tug at what you don't understand, little brother, some fish are bigger than you'. 

Then he opens his hand and looses the coil of its magic, and the little creature bounds lightly down, floats untouched over a deep bog and hesitates only once to look back, long tail a flow of green fire, before it recedes again. 

It leaves them in the dark, aware of each other. Will's words still resound, though both of them have gone silent, and Hannibal turns toward him. No, nothing could compel them here but themselves. "I haven't ever bound you with magic," Hannibal tells him, and the darkness hides the motion his hand makes until his fingers have tucked in at the front of Will's shirt again. They should not do this.

"If your will bids you stay," he continues, letting his tone stay low - they are close enough that they need not speak any louder. "But your thoughts tell you better, how dangerous it is... will you chose to believe and be affected, or to deny and be free?" 

Will feels the tug again, that tempting sweet thing the creature exuded but now more real, warm fingers against his skin as Hannibal places his hand there but doesn't force Will either way. After the bright light of the wisp, Will's eyes are still adjusting, the darkness still impenetrable save for a few tony movements of the moonlight on the swamp. He sighs, closing his eyes and letting his lips remain parted to breathe quietly.

He knows how dangerous this is, how wrong it is, and how much he wants it. And temptation is meant to be hard to resist, meant to be nigh impossible to say no to and step away from and this is just it, exactly it. At once the worst and best kind of temptation.

"I think," he says, his throat clicking just slightly as he swallows, "That I share your hunger for freedom."

He opens his eyes again but doesn't let them travel up, not yet, letting them focus on the collar of Hannibal's shirt as his eyes finally adjust to the darkness enough to wield it again and not be blinded by it.

Hannibal begins to pull then, slowly, very gently. It is not a sudden thing, but rather a pressure that builds as Will does not resist, just the first two fingers of Hannibal's hand curled into Will's shirt. It's not that tight, it's not that much of a hold. William could break it in a moment, with any small movement, and it would be over. Hannibal would allow it, and nothing would have to change except that slow, steady pressure.

"Only freedom? There are other hungers I have," Hannibal suggests, and they are very close now, enough to share breath, enough to be barely inches apart. He is not hesitating this time, but holding. Thinking perhaps. He makes a soft noise, an amused one. 

"This is the sort of danger we will carry everywhere," he warns, and now his lips are brushing William's mouth, but it is not quite a kiss. "No darkness will be fully safe." 

"Darkness is rarely fully safe," Will replies, letting his eyes slip closed again and his lips part just a little more, remembering how he'd laid in bed the night of the wedding, eyes closed, imagining. This comes close, and the memory of what he thought up makes his breath stutter. He leans closer, just enough for the tip of his tongue to touch Hannibal's top lip, before he presses close, not hesitating like he had that evening, but letting their lips meet.

The way his body had responded to just the simplest of any of Hannibal's touches was not even a precursor to how it responds now. It's like a shock but softer, a hold that doesn't stifle, it's a feeling Will wants to explore and understand. He doesn't know what to do with his hands, keeping them at his sides for a moment before carefully moving them to rest on Hannibal's shoulders, more, he thinks, to steady himself than the other.

His fantasy had been sweet, a delicious thing to play with an revisit, but it is nothing compared to having the man pull him closer and deepen the kiss, effectively open himself up to the danger that Will selfishly asked of him. He hums quietly and gently opens his mouth wider.

This would invade even the safety of their rooms, the quiet of the castle halls at night. It would call to them through cracks in the stone walls until they either surrendered - and there was no sense thinking they could hide it forever, or grew mad. Hannibal opens himself to it anyway, pushes his mouth against the willing, parted lips that open to meet it, and takes. 

Hannibal keeps his grip on Will's shirt, a tether that would give at the slightest resistance, but there is not an ounce of it in Will, even when his other hand settles around the Prince's waist, to pull him close enough so the contact is real and solid and heavy, and not just a ghost light as it had been the evening of the wedding.

It feels wonderful, dangerous as it is. The way Will surrenders himself up to Hannibal, but does not cling or smother. There is something that puts Hannibal at ease in the way the Prince's touch settles on him, gentle and uncertain - it does not sit heavy on his skin or seek to drag him down and define him as a thing possessed. While Hannibal is pulling the man closer still, leaning into the touch as they continue to kiss - almost fiercely now, almost desperate - he is careful to return the favor. 

Though the Prince does not yet own himself - not totally, not until the day of his birth - Hannibal does not seek to take possession of him either. Just set him free, and see what happened, as he had done all along. Finally, the need for air drives them apart, and Hannibal's conscience descends on him.

"We should-" he starts, but then he kisses Will again before they've fully caught their breath, shorter, before they must part again. He makes no effort to continue the statement. They should stop - they shouldn't have started. They were going to anyway. 

Will just shakes his head with a quiet whine and kisses back. He doesn't want to hear reason, that they should stop that this is wrong that it's dangerous and the retribution for it will be extreme, right then he doesn't care. But he pulls from the second kiss slowly and lets himself breathe, leans forward to rest his forehead against Hannibal's shoulder as he tries to slow his mind down.

He doesn't know what this means, doesn't even know what he wants, just knows that it feels good enough to risk this getting out of hand. Knows that Hannibal wants it just as badly. He feels the familiar tug of a grin and bites his lip on it, forces himself to feel the energy surge through his system at the touch, the gentleness, the forbiddenness of it all. It's intoxicating and so very empowering.

"What other hungers?" he murmurs finally, looking up again, a quiet challenge to answer. He knows that whatever Hannibal has thought of is far beyond Will's inexperienced, innocent mind, but he wants to see if the man will charm him with words as he had before, or if he'll refrain.

Hannibal finally releases the Prince's shirt and curls his fingers at the back of Will's neck, turning his cheek against the top of Will's head for the contact, comfortable and close. He is content with just the contact for now, not totally certain they should ever push it further, knowing it was likely to happen without their say so. It's a comfortable pressure against his heart.

From this close, he can see the challenge in Will's eyes even in the weakly penetrating moonlight. He chuckles, pushed to answer a question that should have answered itself. Whatever William might be now, he would have power of his own someday, Hannibal can almost feel it blossoming under his fingertips, stretching and striving to break out but held back by the rules of magic. He wondered if when that restlessness faded, if the infatuation with Hannibal would as well. He is not sure what he thinks of the notion.

"The worst kind," he suggests, and he lets his hands drift downward, pushes them over Will's hips, his ass in clear demonstration, then just to the tops of his thighs in back, and pulls him closer. "The sort that rouses you from a sound sleep and leaves you restless and warm beneath your blankets, that asks for cooling when you know you would do better to resist. It springs up impatient, demanding, surprising - leaves one writhing and desperate for contact."

He tips his head away, tilts his chin up in a vague gesture, like a horse tossing its mane. "I'm not wholly used to such apatite," he admits -and with his solitary nature it was unlikely that was untrue. He settled his restlessness in other ways usually, through wandering or picking something curious apart, or riding. 

Will makes a quiet sound and thanks the darkness for keeping the rising blush against his cheeks hidden. He'd certainly experienced similar hunger, and clumsily acted upon it.

"We share that," he breathes after a moment, addressing Hannibal's last statement. He's not used to such desires coursing through him and taking over his concentration and control. He's definitely unused to them being fulfilled. He doesn't elaborate to say that they share a taste for similar things, though he supposes Hannibal knows.

The admission doesn't quite surprise Hannibal, not with Will pressing against him and radiating warmth at the persuasive words Hannibal suggests against his ear. They must ring familiar enough for that reaction, and Hannibal can almost sense the echo of the actions in the way Will shifts against him. He does not drag it to light.

Will doesn't ask what they should do now, either, he doesn't push this, doesn't force it. It's a delicate thing, and dangerous, and hungry as they both were, neither were stupid. Will watches the way Hannibal moves, now so close to him he can feel the muscles bend and coil, and leans in enough to brush his lips very gently against the soft skin of his throat before pulling away.

He is, however, content to take his time. To give Will the opportunity for second thoughts, and his own pace. In total honesty, he is content to savor the slow ride down - he knows he will have plenty of opportunity to do this correctly. He kisses Will again, draws him against his own body in a suggestive slide, and then lets him go. 

The moon is setting, and soon the sun will begin to come up, removing their cover. "Take your time to suffer it, Will," he says, purring and gentle, amused. "It's sweeter if you twist with it for a little while." 

That, as it seems, is that. Hannibal is turning to make his way back out of the trees, his steps as careful and well chosen as before.

Will is quite breathless when Hannibal lets him go, barely suppressing a whine but managing to keep at least some of his dignity. He feels, somehow, that the ride back will not quite be comfortable as he follows Hannibal from the forest and whistles quietly to get Winston to come to him. He takes his time to interact with his horse, scratch behind his ears as he lets his mind slow again, enough to comfortably mount his horse and adjust his grip on the reins.

He supposes two people can play the teasing game, can suffer sweetly and in silence. He can make the ache just as impossible to ignore as Hannibal was making it for him at the moment, the idea actually makes him smile. He guides his horse to where Hannibal stands next to his and watches as he mounts, lets his eyes travel to the sky for a moment before turning Winston to face where he knows roughly the castle to be.

"I'll take the time to take the suffering and give it." he promises with a smirk, checking his stirrups before letting out a loud cry, like a howl, and setting his horse to canter, his laughter carrying back. For a time, for perhaps an hour, they can yell, can speak, can do anything they want to before they're within the tower's view, and within the Queen's domain.

Will does not lightly forget what Hannibal has said about her control.

-

The next day is slow torture. Hannibal perhaps should not have encouraged Will - he had not expected the man to take so to heart the promise that they should endure the burn, enjoy it. The Prince had given no sign that he had so devious and clever a mind when he set it to the art of distraction. Hannibal, were he not the target, would have had to smile at the way the Prince embraced it, how he eased into the role creatively.

Every time Hannibal looked up, the Prince seemed to be nearby, but out of the awareness of others. William waited until all eyes were on Hannibal or the Queen, and then made himself present in Hannibal's awareness, just making steady, deep eye contact and pushing his tongue hungrily over his lower lip, or lounging just so in a languid, sinuous line over both arm rests of a chair.

There are moments when Hannibal simply has to shut his eyes to it, and the pictures suggesting themselves on the blank, dark screens of his eyelids are worse still. He has always prided himself on his composure, but he has never had someone as dedicated to systematically picking it apart - on a level playing field. But as his vision wanders further, the Queen hangs heavier on his arm, leans up to whisper suggestive and sweet in his ear, pulls harder at him for what she wants, and for what he finds that he is further and further averse to. 

However, he can feel her working up to sliding her magic over him again, and he decides it better to indulge her when he can at least say it was his own decision fully, rather to endure the slick, oily feeling on his skin. If, as dinner ends, and they say goodnights, she holds his arm firmly and takes him up the stairs, Hannibal looks back over his shoulder long enough to see Will's smirk take a harder, jealous edge, and he spares the Prince an apologetic look, a faint soothing motion of his free hand. 

Will gets used to the dull ache, grows quite an appetite for it as he watches Hannibal respond, watches the man turn his eyes to him long enough to notice and then pointedly look away. And he takes every opportunity, every chance, without ever doing anything to arouse his stepmother's suspicions that anything at all is astray.

For two days he doesn't even approach the Duke. He lets his eyes linger, lets the slow stretch of his back over a chair by the fire with a good book be the only motion he makes for the hours he reads there, or the quiet groan as his spine realigns upon standing to stretch be the only sound Hannibal hears from him beyond his quietly murmured wish for them to have a good night as he leaves.

He doesn't make it overbearing, keeps the man hungry enough to seek out the subtle shifts and looks from him. And he notices, after the fourth day, that Hannibal's eyes are on him more and more frequently, so he makes it worse; he stops showing off. He returns to being the normal, quiet man he had been before this had started. He stops deliberately sitting with his knees parted wide in the chair, stops resting his fingers against his lips as he thinks, just stops, pretends that he no longer cares, and watches Hannibal twitch with the impatience. He gives him one look, just one, and a pressing of teeth to his lip until it loses color to show he's still playing, but nothing more.

He spends his evenings - once his mind is clear enough for it - reading the journal. The maroon ink never returns to black, and the entries become more and more frenzied, scared. He talks of the inability to keep himself, the fear of someone taking his life when others no longer protect it for him. It's perhaps another six months into the entries that Will learns that the ink is not ink at all, but blood. A binding, weak and primitive, but one nonetheless. A part of himself in an object no one else can touch or take away, for once the blood dries, it can't be returned to him, and part of who he is ends up on the page forever.

The entries get disturbingly more morbid, and Will puts the book away, despite how strongly it forces him to read on.

On the fifth night he sets the journal aside, a reassuring hand on the book's spine to keep it still enough to allow him to leave. He gathers the other book - a historical novel that he thoroughly enjoyed around the terrifying entries - and makes his way to the tower. Perhaps halfway up he feels that he won't be alone up there, perhaps it isn't the first night Hannibal has been waiting for Will and Will has denied him the company. The thought makes him smile.

Will slows his steps, checks himself over as much as he can with the spiral stairs keeping his concentration, and enters the tower with as cool an expression as he can manage. He has perhaps a moment in which to silently gloat, silently tilt his head in victory at having made the man suffer more than he himself did, before his thoughts - and mouth and hands - are otherwise occupied.

It isn't actually the first night that Hannibal had come to the tower - the previous evening he had settled in, cradled by books and intent to tell William he had best back down a little. Instead, Will had never come, and it had left him musing that when he'd suggest William twist a little, he had never expected the Prince to curl the rope into his own fingers and wind it prettily back about Hannibal's neck in so undeniable a way. 

Now he simply pushes the Prince up against the folding surface of books nearest, where the pages shuffle as if in chuckling approval or perhaps scolding them - Hannibal pays them little mind either way, instead curling his hands at Will's hips and pressing against him, sliding his knee between the man's thighs and pushing into the kiss until he is sure William feels it, feels how the last few days have tested him, and then finally draws back, breathing fast.

"You," he suggests, making eye contact, without giving any sign of easing up the pressure of their two bodies together. "Gave me no sign you were so vexingly creative before you let me start this game." 

Will gasps at the pleasing pressure and arches his neck before tilting his head back down again.

"And you never warned me I would have to wait." he replies, tone just as low, just as amused, but he can feel how helpless he is here, pressed back and held there by Hannibal's strong demanding hands, and if the kiss is anything Will can judge by, he thinks his wait might be over.

"I could've done worse," he murmurs, trying to kiss the Duke again, "I could have knelt, eyes on you, attention nowhere but," Will finds that the only movement he is able to successfully achieve involves a slow deliberate roll against the leg between his own and this time he's certain he's the one suffering more for his week of amusement. "I could have held the book lower, fingers splayed over the leg hanging over the side of the chair..."

And he could have, but if he had, the suffering would not have been Hannibal's alone, and the entire purpose of the game was to get the man to bend to him first.

"Perhaps I will, if it takes me another week to get your attention."

The sound Hannibal makes against his open mouth is almost a threat. This was real and dangerous - so much more dangerous than he had anticipated, now that Will had proven what he was capable of in desperation. "You thought about it," Hannibal seems amused at exactly how calculated this had been, how much of Will's thoughts it must have taken up. 

Though the suggestion that Hannibal could drive him to further lengths of temptation, that he could draw this game out the same way William had gives him the beginning of an idea. He does not give Will much chance to argue, sliding his leg in counterpoint to how Will is rolling his hips against his thigh, Hannibal considers the image of William kneeling, of the images he'd already presented and painted, only writ more clearly, more like an invitation.

Very dangerous. Perhaps that was part of why it was so irresistible. "You have my attention now," Hannibal suggests, in a tone that hints that perhaps Will wasn't quite ready to have as much as he did, and his hand slides between them, over Will's belly in a slow and deliberate line down that skirts aside at the very last second to continue over Will's thigh instead. "And I have an excellent memory." 

For revenge. 

Will swallows and ducks his head to watch Hannibal's hand slide over him, feeling the way he drew in his stomach on reflex, the way he tries to arch against his hand when it moves so deliberately away. He doesn't admit just how much he's thought about it, can't imagine detailing his pathetic attempts at pleasure to this man who looked more like a predator than Will had ever seen him.

"I'll be sure to make you remember, then," Will offers, the only thing he can think to say when he didn't want to talk at all. But the thought, the very thought that he could have Hannibal remember and want for more makes him bite his lips before bringing his hands up to frame Hannibal's face and draw him in to kiss him again, a daring thing considering he's let the man push and lead until this point. He'll make him remember. Remember how he tastes, the sounds he makes, the way his body feels against him...

It's late in the evening and when he'd walked the corridors Will had noticed no one out or awake at all. Even knowing that, he's reluctant to make a sound beyond the heavy breaths and quiet little moans that Hannibal swallows. He ruts forward and feels his muscles tense in pleasure, hands sliding to grip Hannibal's hair as he does it again, dignity be damned. He doubts he'll know the meaning of the word by the time they're through.

Hannibal lets him push against him, though he subsides just enough every time Will makes a motion that he can't get any real pressure out of it, that he can tempt and tease himself, but there is no chance for relief, and all the while his hand works between them. Up the inside of one thigh, down the other without venturing where Will wants his fingers. He gives William the lead as far as drawing Hannibal into kisses that become more ferocious every time Hannibal skirts his hand near the straining bulge of fabric at Will's crotch, but he does not relent.

Even as Will arches up, and the corners of Hannibal's mouth turn up into the kiss and he deliberately moves his hand in the opposite direction, up the span of Will's chest to press low on his neck, over the join of collar bones. 

William didn't need to make him remember, Hannibal already would - had occasionally allowed his wilful mind to wander, but his imaginings fell short of the soft, restrained sounds that Will is making against him. Hannibal wishes they needn't be quiet, that there was no worry of discovery - but there is, and no amount of good luck would take the place of good sense.

Finally, as the efforts become further desperate, further wanton and frustrated, Hannibal disengages his knee and simply keeps Will pinned against the wall with his frame, giving the Prince nothing to push himself against, ignoring the desperate, angry sounds and the pulling at his hair, the way the Prince works the tie free and threatens to dishevel him utterly.

"Tell me what you imagined," Hannibal suggests conversationally, shifting to keep Will still, though if he makes any sign of genuine discomfort, he will be released. "While you settled yourself to such displays for me, tell me how you wanted them to play out." He closes his mouth, hot and eager and wet, over the lobe of Will's ear, and waits. 

Will groans, the sound caught in time between pursed lips before he sighs out and, for a moment, stops struggling. He's breathing heavily, already much more undone than Hannibal is, and, he supposes, that's the point. The suggestion he speak is a cruel one and Will lets his eyes close for just a moment, just resting between the wall of semi-soft book spines and Hannibal's body. It could be crueller, he could be asking what Will imagines alone at night when he can't sleep and the walls in his room are the only witness to his struggle.

"I imagined your hands," he murmurs, an honest answer but one interrupted by another gasp of pleasure, another tension of muscles, "I imagined that were we alone, I wouldn't dare make you move... but come to you instead." and it's suddenly easier, murmuring his silly wants against the man's ear as he works his lips down behind his ear and lower to his jaw, in the most deliciously distracting way.

Will can feel himself trembling with the urge to buck forward. He refrains for as long as he can.

"Everything I showed you, I wanted to do," he continues, another honest answer. Every shift in his chair suggested how he wanted to be moving against Hannibal in his, the way he would slide down his chair, legs hooked over the other arm, in a suggestion he would rather be lying flat, body curved just so. In truth, Will has had little enough experience to only imagine, only pretend, and hope he'd had the desired effect.

From the way he's held, it seems he has.

Hannibal exhales against his ear, in a long slow breath that suggests he at last is truly affected - again. There had been some balm to his stretched patience when he at last had Will real and solid in his hands, and pushing against him. The limitations of his language aren't because the Prince lacks imagination, but rather experience, and the promises he'd woven anyway are enough to yank very hard at Hannibal's resolve to not let this progress very far at all today. He wants Will to know what he's missing - or at least enough of it that he will feel as hungry as Hannibal has these last few days. 

"What would you see me do?" Will breathes, unable to stay still anymore, struggling a little in impatience not discomfort, and finding his efforts in vain.

"Oh," Hannibal breathes and rewards him this time, finally sliding his hand down Will's chest in a line that reaches its destination. "I have seen enough, I think." He closes his hand over Will's cock through the layers of fabric, and gives him a moment of direct contact and pressure. "It would suit me better to be involved, now."

With his fingers curling along either side of the well defined bulge, Hannibal strokes suggestively, watches Will's eyes close tight at the same time his mouth forms a loose, open shape that he presses his own against and swallows the next sound that comes from him. He cannot deny now- not from the heat of his skin, not from the cold, excited sweat gathering at the base of Hannibal's spine - how much this was affecting him too. "I would push you down into your bed and stroke like this until you begged, until you didn't know what you wanted." 

Will has tipped his head back, his hands clawing at the books behind him, and Hannibal gently puts his mouth on the man's throat, possessive, but he does not mark, before he suddenly draws back, with an outward rasp of breath. It's a supreme effort of will, but the victorious, predatory expression on his features suggests it's utterly intentional. "And then I'd show you what it was that you did." 

Will whimpers, an utterly helpless noise, and tries to twist away. Now that he has this, now that he knows he can have it, can have this and more if he asks properly, begs perhaps, he's already unsure of what he wants. But he can see it, playing out in his mind clear as day, of Hannibal pressing him down into the mattress and holding him still, stroking him up until every part of Will's body was pliant and trembling, knees spread and hands out of the way.

"Hannibal..." he arches harder, the muscles in his neck standing out stark in the low light of the tower room, and how he wishes it had a door... "Please..."

And it's true, he doesn't know what he's asking for, he has no idea what he wants beyond the man to truly lay him down and make good on his threat, and even then he's sure he'll be halfway to madness before an idea even comes to him of what he wants. He wants too much, mind working too fast to sort and prioritise anything. He rolls his hips forward, turns his head away with a quiet moan, and grits his teeth as Hannibal continues stroking, unrelenting and calm. He isn't sure how much he can endure, and it's the absolute terror of humiliating himself in such a way that's holding him back now, his voice he has no control over.

"Please... how would you show me?" Will's entire body is shaking now, with the effort of standing, the effort of holding back the sounds he wishes he could make, the desperate fumbling he refuses to give into until even that level of willpower abandons him and he tugs at Hannibal's shirt, wanting him closer, wanting his hands against skin...

Hannibal slows his pace - he doesn't intend to let Will tip over, not today. Just keep him close and leave him wanting, the way he had left Hannibal with open eyes late at night, biting the back of his wrist until the images subsided in his mind. He did not even have the freedom to relieve himself the way William did - he shared a bed.

"With my hands, as you asked," Hannibal adds to his suggestion a squeeze, before he feels the shaking in Will's limbs get a little too much, and removes his grip at last, relying on suggestion, proximity. "And with yours. Perhaps my mouth."

On that notion he pushes Will's shoulders with both hands to hold him still and sinks down to his knees, as William had threatened to. He flattens his hands over the saddle of Will's hips, and looks up, his mouth dangerously close to Will's hard cock - almost close enough that the stir of air reaches him through fabric and all. "If you asked as nicely as you just did."

Will whines, a low, drawn-out sound of near-anguish at the offer and suggestion and brings a hand up to bite the skin between his thumb and forefinger to keep himself quiet beyond the plea he lets escape. His heart is hammering, eyes blown wide and dark and he has never been this close before, this needy, and he watches Hannibal enjoy every second.

"Please," he gasps, "Hannibal, please..."

But he does not yet, does not even touch him directly now, just watches him, and then slides a hand deliberate, knowing that his words will keep Will company for the next few nights the way the reality will not. His thumb works along the crease where thigh joins body, and then his hand turns, pushes behind Will's balls in faint insinuation. "And then I'd work you open - but I wouldn't take you. Not the first time - just show you how it felt to stretch." 

Will is fairly certain the sound he makes is higher than any he's made before, even with the skin between his teeth keeping him as muted as he can be. He swallows thickly and nods, a permission or understanding he isn't quite sure, but the idea, the gentle suggestion of fingers against him makes him tremble harder, free hand slipping down as though to stroke himself through this, let the unbelievable, overwhelming desire flood him, but he stills his hand, curls it into a white-knuckled fist at the base of his shirt, fabric crinkled in his fist as it had been the first time he'd imagined this.

The corners of Hannibal's mouth turn up sharply, as he presses his fingers in firm indication, and then he sits back on his heels, makes one open-mouthed swipe at Will's still clothed cock before he stands, removing all contact. 

"But first I will see you wait," he says, purring, vengeful.

And Will sobs. The sound innocent and loud even around his hand and he steps forward to insinuate himself into Hannibal's arms again, to feel him hard against him, strong hands controlling him as surely as his words were.

"Don't, please don't," he breathes, hands twisted in the shirt just below Hannibal's collar and holding on as though the only thing keeping him standing is the man in front of him, "You've seen me wait... I've waited as surely as you have, Hannibal, please..." he presses close and kisses him again, still trembling with need and desperation, but finding himself smiling into it, hands relaxing as he ducks his head and just pants before lifting his eyes to beg in silence.

It's as much a trial for Hannibal, when William begs beautifully, puts himself back into Hannibal's arms beautifully and shows him wide, ready eyes with pupils gone so dark the blue is only a faint ring around them. Hannibal has to exhale a breath to steady himself, pull his composure back hard to himself. 

It may be the only time he can ever gather quite enough will to refuse whatever William asks in the future - especially when he asks with clinging fingers and his body a long, begging submissive line that promises to be good, promises to be pleasing in a way that Hannibal has not enjoyed in so long that he could shore himself up against it now.

"I know you have," he assures the Prince - his Prince, though he has woven no spell, as surely as the Queen had sought to possess both of them. He soothes, not unkindly, but he does not bend on the subject. "I should ask you to truly wait, for what you've put me through this last week, forbid you to even touch yourself."

He would know, he would know now that he knew what to look for, how to see it in William's eyes, the way they expressed need and the way he looked begging - but he knew he would not keep to the rule himself. As beautiful as William was suffering, Hannibal is not so cruel as to back up his next statement with explicit forbidding of any relief at all. "On your birthday," he promises. "Then, you'll have what you ask." 

Will's eyes widen in disbelief and he just blinks, lips parted as though to deny, to petulantly demand. Instead he presses them gently together before he swallows and leans in to kiss him again, a gentle thing now, soft, trying for complete submission instead of blatant begging. It does nothing more than garner another soft sigh from the Duke. His words, his law. Will's lips linger, eyes down, before he pulls back.

Two weeks. Just over two weeks and he's expected to wait? Almost vindictively he wants to tease more, do enough to have Hannibal break his own rules in a frenzy, blind by pleasure. They stand quiet, both taking the time to come back to themselves, to let their minds relax them, as much as they can relax, before either speak. And it's Will who breaks the silence first.

"On my birthday, I would have you mine." it's a wistful thing, a quiet request he knows won't be true, but he wants it regardless, wants to know the man understands it. Their dangerous, torturous little game will end them both if they're not careful. And Will is certain that even if he's not granted relief with Hannibal, they will not avoid each other as they had been in the five days past. He smiles.

Hannibal smiles in return, but he cannot promise that - had they known a year ago, had they met long before there was to be a wedding, then perhaps... But there is a ring tight on his finger, and to try and defy the Queen so far as to open his soul and entrust half of it to another - even should he want to, and Hannibal is old enough to know that this may just be the earliest infatuation of someone who is not familiar with the feeling - would be ultimately a bad decision for both of them. He can give only, "From the time the sun sets until it rises again." 

"Perhaps next time I will return the favor," Will murmurs, "Leave you as you have left me." he lets his eyes meditate on Hannibal's lips before moving higher, "And do it without even once touching you." it would leave them both undone, but if Will can bring Hannibal as close as the man had brought him, and do it by touching himself, and forcing himself pliant and obedient to his own hand, then he would do it.

The image settles deep in Hannibal's mind, and it's clear he takes Will's meaning, clear that he can almost see it already, arrayed out only for him, to test every iron fiber of his will until it stretched or broke. He kisses William on his thoughtful, clever mouth. "You would find it effective, to an extent." They would both be frustrated, maddened, tempted, and then left again unfulfilled and teased. "By all means, try."

The result at the end of the wait will be sweet, anxious and as desperate as they had been moments ago. He pushes his fingers soothingly through Will's hair, in a promise - it would be worth the wait. And perhaps the sweet agony slowly writing itself on the Prince's face as he desperately tried to distract himself every moment from the fact that all of the minutes have not yet passed would eventually break Hannibal's will.

He does not give Will an excuse to suffer prettily in his presence by revealing it. 

Will just laughs. And that, at least, is an easy sound, a relief in its own way. He doesn't want to go, return to his room alone, perhaps give Hannibal his suffering and not touch, hold out until the next evening. But it's late enough to be early, for it to be dangerous for them to be here and not where they belong.

"I won't fail." he offers in reply, the smile now languid and sleepy. He wants to convince Hannibal to stay, to set something on the stairs to deter anyone who tries to find them, but he doesn't ask. Magic should never be forced, only given, and such a demand would be both foolish as well as selfish. Instead he nuzzles his cheek against Hannibal's with a sigh and kisses it.

"Tomorrow?" he asks, tone both hopeful and low, eyes still blown wide and dark enough to be suggestive. "Or, perhaps, we should go riding again." it's an offer, to take or refuse. He thinks, amused, that if Hannibal ever has to chastise him again, he need only offer this as punishment. Will shall certainly learn quickly.

"Tomorrow," Hannibal agrees, and he lifts the backs of his fingers to push them over Will's cheek, to show that he sees how much he is asking - how much he will be asking over the next long pair of weeks. "We'll go riding."

Hannibal is in that dangerous stretch where if Will asked him, he might perhaps allow them to stay here and quiet and together, but they would be missed in the morning, and the castle would reach here to find them when the Queen's will went searching -and then they might lose the reaches of the towers as well, for their privacy. 

"I'll bring blankets," he allows, with faint mischief to his tone. The woods would offer cover, and Hannibal's magic would attract very little attention there, unlike here. That was assuming they both made it. Hannibal is fairly certain of his will, and doubly positive that William would try to test it. They would see how it goes - the challenge, frankly, interests him. He has not faced one he wasn't certain he would overcome in too long to remember. 

Leaning down, Hannibal kisses him one last time before he draws straight and away, finds the tie William had clawed out of his hair and puts it back in place. They had best go, and soon. "After the noon meal," he suggests - they wouldn't be missed for several hours then, neither needed until supper. "At the stables."

Will swallows and nods, more an incline of his head and a slow lowering of his eyes as though in a bow. When he lifts them again he's smirking. He gestures for Hannibal to leave first, straightening his shoulders and arranging himself to look more presentable also.

"I did actually come here with purpose." he says by way of explanation, "Since one was denied me, I shall choose a book and leave."

He doesn't watch Hannibal descend the stairs, just turns on the spot when he hears him go and sighs, covering his eyes with one hand as he fights a smile, breathing a quiet curse into the still room. They were in too deep already, both of them, and although Will can almost feel the breeze brushing his skin from the precipice, he wants nothing more than to find a way to have Hannibal in his room before the week is up, tempted to much he breaks his own word.

Will lingers in the room until a book nudges him. He doesn't pay it much heed as he carefully places it under his arm and makes his way back. He'll look at it once he's finished the diary, once his mind is no longer awash with the taste and smell and feel of Hannibal against him.

Downstairs, Hannibal pauses to wash his face, to plunge his hands in cold water until his breathing stills and his concentration returns to the wrought iron of normal. It would not do to have the Queen discover this on him, to have her scent by some action or some lingering trace of Will, what exactly was happening.

But she barely stirs when he settles in beside her, as she had the night before when he'd returned just before dawn - her sleep has become deep and troubled of late, leaving her twitching and scratching unless he settled a heavy arm over her to still her limbs down - but even this never woke her from her troubled dreams.

His own threatened troubles enough, after this evening. 

-

The next morning brings relief, at least to some extent. William is too preoccupied to taunt or tease - or perhaps he's learned his lesson, though on occasion Hannibal catches him with such a look of desperate impatience on his features that he feels the need to bite his own knuckles and remind himself why they are waiting.

Because patience and caution were virtues they would need to survive this. Because Hannibal needs to be certain this isn't just a passing infatuation of youth - and not just a little bit, because he is certain that after two weeks of this, William will come apart beautifully in his hands. Probably several times, until he was sore and aching with pleasure. The thought was so distracting that the Queen pinched him out of it twice, and he made his excuses and apologies on the excuse of faint homesickness. 

She did not look so well herself, and Hannibal saw her dutifully to her nap after lunch before he took up a bundle of thick blankets under the premise of perhaps swimming in the lake and not wanting to lay out on sand afterward, and went down to bind them to the back of his saddle, readying for the trip that promised to deliver the sweetest torture.

He wouldn't deny that his heart was a slow, steady pounding that he was unusually aware of, or that his mind was both anxious and quiet, that he knew his resolve would be bent and pulled. He soothes his mare with a gentle pat, but she is anxious enough simply by picking up his attitude that she seems unable to stay still, shifting and swishing her tail, and occasionally impatiently stomping a hoof in something that isn't quite irritation. 

Winston picks up on it from her, and greets Will with an upraised head, and wide flared nostrils, his chest pushed up against the stall door and his ears pushed forward in eagerness. 

Will calms him as best he can, cooing gently at the animal as he prepares him for another day-long trip, adjusting his saddle lightly and leading him out with the lure of apple slices and carrot.

By some masochistic devotion, Will had heeded Hannibal’s words and refrained from touching himself the night before. Perhaps to test himself, perhaps to prove a strange sort of loyalty to the man now in front of him. Either way, Will has spent the morning in pleasurable discomfort. He eyes the blankets Hannibal has tied to the saddle of his mare, adjusts his own saddlebags filled with food and water skins for their day, before leading Winston out of the stables and mounting.

They don’t race off as they had before, they leave their horses to go at a pleasurable rate until out of sight enough to speed them up, Will turning occasionally to give Hannibal a cryptic look, or a smile that the other returned. They reach the forest quickly and let their horses slow to a leisurely walk as they navigate through the trees. The entire time they have not spoken, not a single word, even in greeting, and the further into the trees they get, the wider Will’s smile grows.

When they reach the lake, Will dismounts first, pulling off the saddlebags and – now that he knows better – the saddle itself as well as the bridle, in case Winston wants to take another unplanned dip in the water. He doesn’t quite give Hannibal the space and time to unload his horse as thoroughly before he’s pressing against him, mouth hungry and demanding, lips curved up at the reciprocation he wins almost immediately.

“I waited,” he breathes, almost as soon as they break for breath, a confession he’s been keeping silent all day, until the right moment for Hannibal to hear it, “Surely I’ve paid penance for the five days I cost you.”

With the building silence, Hannibal had expected that something was coming. Hannibal is caught while undoing the girth, pushed up hard against his mare before he can turn fully, and the he's leaning back into her side with William pressed against him, and he forgives the indignity of the position. The soft, desperate tone painted in hot breath against his mouth sparks hot interest deep within Hannibal again, when the time since contact and the ride had just soothed him down somewhat - it's almost alarming, how quickly Will has learned to flip the switch in him. 

He finds his balance again and eases his weight off of the mare's side, settling his arms around Will. "You waited," he agrees, mouth turning up into a wry expression at the clear desperation in the Prince. It isn't that Hannibal isn't just as interested, but the test of it - the self-imposed flex within his own set of boundaries. He knows what is implied in those two words - that William hadn't found any relief in the rest of the morning, hadn't eased the tension that Hannibal can feel pouring through the boy. "And here we are."

He reaches back and undoes the roll of blankets from the saddle's back, passing them to Will, amusement still on his features, before he turns to pull down the saddle at last, to slip the headstall over the Mare's ears so she can join Winston at the water's edge. He has no fear that she'll wander far.

"Perhaps within the treeline so we don't feel so exposed," Hannibal suggests, mildly, with an undertone of feral, infuriating amusement.

Will knows the lake well, he’s been coming here for as long as he could ride, and he makes his way to a copse of trees not far from the shore where they will still be able to see the horses, the lake, and unlikely as the possibility is, anyone who may come looking for them here. He finds he has to relax his grip on the blankets when his fingers start to ache. It’s a strange new nervousness he hasn’t experienced before. It’s not a pressure so much as a challenge, but it’s certainly there.

He spreads the blankets out enough to offer them both space to lounge, and rests his arms behind himself as he watches Hannibal free his horse for the afternoon before setting his saddle next to where Will left his and picking up the bags Will had brought with him. he moves to the trees at leisure, most likely deliberately if his tone earlier was any indication, and Will finds himself caught. Not trapped, certainly, but unable or unwilling to shift away.

He draws one knee up and tilts his head a little, fingers curled gently in the blanket as he makes himself relax and finds it difficult with the way he can feel Hannibal’s eyes on him.

“Did you sleep?” he asks.

"Not well," Hannibal answers, and he settles on the blankets, which are thick and comfortable. He can see the tension in Will, the way he valiantly tries to take himself past it, to lay himself open and alluring. "But I managed to close my eyes for a while."

He sets Will's saddle bags out on the edge of the blanket, and then rewards Will's further patience by settling down next to him, reaching out to pull him up against him and take another kiss. "Did you, while you waited?"

Hannibal imagines not - or perhaps he had - perhaps exhaustion had made it easier for him to keep his fingers away from himself. Either that or he had lain awake as surely as Hannibal had, every moment an agony. Still he curls his arms around Will and lets them rest together, front to back. To just enjoy the contact and proximity for a little while. 

And to feel the restlessness wake in Will's limbs, the way his muscles bunch and shift as he tries to keep himself still.

In truth, Will can’t remember if he slept, the night turned to morning in a strange sort of fevered sweetness he hasn’t experienced before. He enjoys the closeness offered him but finds himself unable to just lie still against it.

“I don’t know,” he replies honestly. He thinks of his own threat earlier, of how he wanted to bring Hannibal down to the edge of endurance and do it with the denial of touch. He’s not sure, now, as he presses back against Hannibal gently enough to not be a demand, that he’ll be able to manage it without falling off the edge himself.

But then… he hadn’t been explicitly forbidden the right to relief, simply the right to relief by Hannibal’s hand. The thought makes him smile and he turns, lies on his back and brings a hand up to gently stroke his knuckles over Hannibal’s throat. He doesn’t know if this game will play out in his favor, has no idea if he imagines the effect he has on the Duke, who seems far more composed than Will, under so much more control.

“You left me on the edge of reason yesterday.” He admits quietly. “In return for the week I made you suffer.”

His eyes flick up, he tilts his head back enough to see Hannibal’s eyes.

“I did promise to leave you in a similar state today. Since you are so fond of fair trade.”

"I think more properly, this would be termed payback." Hannibal suggests but he tilts his chin up and lets Will touch his throat as a cat might lean into the touch. He knows the terms - William had laid them out for him in just the right amount of insinuation for him yesterday. He does not know that he will survive two weeks of this kind of temptation.

Instead, Hannibal sits up, settles back with his legs tucked in together lotus style, and leans back on his hands, issuing a challenge to Will's challenge - it was one thing to promise to take someone apart without ever touching their body, it was another thing to realize their attention was on you wholeheartedly while you worked to slowly take yourself apart.

"Best remind me of your terms," he suggests, as Will stretches himself into the role eagerly, apparently utterly lacking in shame - nor should he have any at all, the picture he presented when laid back and sinuous was beyond alluring. Hannibal's eyes are already changing from amusement and reserve to wholly attentive.

“I had few,” Will replies, simply lying pliant and comfortable, “Only to see if I could bring you to a level of desperation where your movements come outside of your control.” As Will’s had, he remembers one moment being pressed against a wall and the next curled into Hannibal’s arms, but no explicit memory of getting from one to the other. He wants that. He wants to see the man struggle with himself, with wanting to touch, to control, and deny him both, until the want becomes an action Hannibal doesn’t anticipate.

It’s a little overwhelming, how different words and actions really are when put into practice. Will had anticipated that Hannibal would watch him, that was the idea, but now that he was, Will finds himself at a loss as to how to make himself desirable for him. He’s dealt with enough falseness in the castle to worry he’ll overdo something, oversell it, and lose his audience entirely. His inexperience scares him.

“Watch.” Will says finally, deciding he can do this if he doesn’t have to watch in turn, if all he has to go on are the slight hitches in breath and the shift of Hannibal’s clothing. Will bites his lip lightly and lets it go before letting his knees rest comfortably apart, one hand on his stomach, the other at his collarbone. 

Hannibal stays still, his posture less open, and his eyes close partway in a pleased expression that is faintly cat like. The stipulations he had been given did not involve not distracting Will with his own voice, but that's a card he holds against his chest. He will wait until there is a hesitation, or until he's distracted enough that it might utterly ruin him. He doesn't know if Will can accomplish his goal, but he's willing to give the Prince an opportunity.

After all, he'd taken one himself - there was enough of a deadline ahead of them to allow for several volleys and charges, which was partially why he'd set it, and partially to test the both of them. 

Will remembers how he’d won the man’s distraction previously by being subtle. Small gestures, a specific posture… so Will does the same now, letting the fingers at his collarbone travel higher, lets his head tilt back to let them curl gently around his throat and caress the skin there, just touching and nothing more. But it’s enough for him, for Will’s eyes to slip closed and remember how Hannibal’s hand had felt there, how good it would feel it was there again. he hums quietly and feels his legs shift a little, sliding further down the blanket but a little wider. His other hand shifts to follow, teasing as Hannibal had done down his thighs and not where he desperately needs the touch to be.

Hannibal's eyes trace the movements Will's hands make, and it takes him a moment to realize they are very closely approximating the very same ones he had traced the previous evening. He can feel the phantom sensations against his fingertips, the warm skin, the muscles jumping and trembling as they had been, and it's cleverly done. The touches must have burned themselves into Will's awareness, he must feel them still as Hannibal had made them. 

His mouth moves of its own accord, pulling his lower lip between his teeth for any sensation that wasn't remembered, and he tips his head and considers the lines of throat presented in careful surrender, the way Will skirts himself again and again with his hands on his thighs, over his stomach and chest, the way his body is responding - his cock hardening in his pants even without yet being touched.

The feel of it answering Hannibal's touches through layers of fabric is still clear enough in his mind. "Will you be so merciless with yourself as I was," he starts, and he is smiling - he can see how tightly closed Will's eyes are. "When you have the option to do whatever you wish?"

Will makes a very pleased noise and lets his eyes open just enough to see.

“Perhaps.” He suggests. He could be as merciless. He could keep the layers of clothes against him as he touches, could stop just before it gets too much… or he could be merciful to himself and merciless to the Duke. Allow him to watch fingers skirt skin, shift away if he tries to touch him. it all depends on how long Will can force himself to last, and it may not be as long as he hopes if Hannibal continues to purr suggestions his way.

He cups himself gently, just once, and lets his eyes close again as he continues to tease, until his hips are shifting up and his quiet breaths are accompanied with soft whines he knows Hannibal remembers. He twists, both hands down against his thighs now, legs spread in neither invitation or show, but because he’s allowed himself to sink far enough to forget he’s doing this for someone. He draws the heel of his hand against himself and arches his neck with a gasp.

“Will you be able to resist me,” he murmurs vaguely, tugging the tie of his pants gently until it comes loose, “When I have the option to do whatever I wish?”

Hannibal's eyes trail down from Will's face - from his barely open eyes grown so dark they seem to be just shadows under his lashes - to his fingers working his own laces, and that's a sensation he does not have. Not yet, he reminds himself anyway, though he can imagine that Will feels the faint resisting slide of leather against leather and then the moment where it slides free, the loops come undone. Will is watching him as he does it.

His smile is languid, a gentle thing that’s interrupted when Will slides his hand under the fabric and strokes himself properly, not yet enough to see, but very much enough to suggest. His sounds become more frequent, a little less restrained though still quiet, and he lets his eyes open enough to see Hannibal again, enough for the other to see how dark they are, and quietly moans his name.

If the actions had Hannibal's attention, the sound of his name painted in Will's desperate voice - he's heard it of course, but never quite like this, never only barely held in check - has his hands twisting into the blanket behind him and holding, like he could anchor himself down. He swallows visibly, shifts his posture and tilts his head as if lifting the angle of his chin would show him more of the picture. 

"Rougher," he suggests, and he watches Will react to just the sound of his voice - it has gone low and harsh in his chest, enough to suggest how much he was affected by it. "You've waited, as you said. I would show you you weren't waiting anymore. That I appreciated -" he draws the word out in a long sound that he can see Will's pace responding to. "What you've been through." 

If it was Hannibal touching him, anyway. It isn't, but he has not been forbidden from making suggestions. And Will finds himself taking them almost on reflex. He jerks a little at the change, but doesn’t stop, not when he has Hannibal’s attention so completely, can see the way he’s holding himself back from doing more than feeding Will suggestions. And he wants him to move, to shift closer, to let go of himself for a moment, just one.

His back arches and Will sighs, eyelids fluttering a moment before he smiles and bites his lip on a quiet groan. It’s still slow, everything still hidden bar the shape of his hand through the fabric and the movement that suggests as much as it doesn’t show. But it’s no longer a teasing soft thing, and it’s no longer as easy for Will to keep his composure. It’s difficult to stay in a fantasy when you have only two hands and want to imagine so much at once.

He draws one hand back to his face, pressing against his lips before sliding lower, tugging his bottom lip down with the movement as his breathing increases and becomes irregular and stuttered.

“You’d just appreciate with your hands?” he asks, words breathless but still amused, challenging, and he lets go just enough to slide his pants further down his hips, enough to see. Will brings up his hand to slowly, deliberately, lick a wet line up the center before returning it to gently rub again until his fingers curl into a harsher grip. He keeps his tongue against his top lip a moment before he sighs and the smile grows too wide to keep it there.

Watching each inch of skin appear - Hannibal's hands give up on holding the blanket tightly and finally he lets go with one to settle it on his knee and rub slow, distracting circles for himself, pushing harder at points when he most needs the pressure, but then he utters a breathy chuckle. "Not just my hands," he agrees. "But don't try bending that far..."

Will's idea is better, the line of wet from his own mouth. Hannibal watches, watches the expressions play themselves in very clear description of how Will feels at any given second, and he discovers it's very difficult - in a way he wants to be the one putting them there. He is - to an extent. This is for his benefit, but it would be so rewarding to just take - control, to take what was offered, to take his own pleasure at the same time. 

Hannibal holds out for an admirably long amount of time, until Will's fingers are dry again, until they're both nearly twisting to be free of their bonds, and then he moves, settles next to Will for a better view, sits hip to hip to watch the expressions play out over the Prince's features before he reaches for his wrist - this time, it's his tongue making a thick stripe of wet up Will's palm, tasting his skin and sweat and readiness, and then he surrenders his hold again - he hasn't strictly broken his word.

Will watches him, sure he won’t manage to hold out much longer before he succumbs, but the look in Hannibal’s eyes is perfect: hungry and dark and close, so close to taking what he wants. Will settles his hand and tilts his head back on a sigh.

“Two weeks?” he asks, and it’s a challenge, wondering if Hannibal will be able to keep himself away for that entire time. Will won’t push, if the Duke tells him again that he will get nothing until his birthday, then Will will content himself with tempting the man and teasing him, but not pushing beyond that. But as he starts the unrelenting rhythm again he just wishes Hannibal would give in.

When Will comes, it’s with Hannibal’s name on his lips again, and it’s such a pleasing motion to relax against the blanket and almost melt into it. the pleasure is intense, exhausting, and Will finds himself grinning again, a victory, that he had allowed himself this and made Hannibal watch. He wonders if he’ll ever sleep calmly again, with that image behind his eyelids and the thought of how much better if could be if he was the one eliciting such sounds and tremors from Will instead.

“You won’t last two weeks.” He informs him, tone very much amused. He wants to kiss him again, to touch. If all they can get in their time escaping is the gentle press of bodies together in the shade then he would enjoy every second.

"There is only one way to find out," Hannibal suggests, and he leans down, splays his palm over William's chest and kisses him deeply, appreciatively. As much as he knew this was for him, as much as he felt the sharp tug as William tried to change his mind - and did such a delicious, tempting job of it - it was a new experience for Will, he was sure.

Though if this was what he was capable of now, just before he began to flex into his own power when he hit the required, magical date - Hannibal was fairly sure that after the Prince's birthday would come the real trial. He settles down beside Will, pulling him close, trying to resolve himself to how much pleasurable agony anything prolonged between them will be.

It's then that Hannibal remembers his real purpose for coming in the first place, and he thinks - perhaps - that this may not last too long after all. He presses his mouth to Will's again, to hide the expression - and steel his resolve. The Queen was not her step son - and it was unlikely his plan would do the man any great harm - but he doubts Will would approve of it anyway. 

He will just have to be very careful.

-

They return before dinner, as planned, and Will can’t help feel like he’s stifled. It’s beyond, even, the fact that he can no longer touch Hannibal as he pleases, or even look at him without drawing attention. The concentration he’d spent perfecting the subtle glances weighs on him and he excuses himself from dinner citing a headache. His room is cool and quiet, and for a few moments he does nothing but pace it slowly, just to feel it as his own space again. The crushing feeling fades somewhat.

As much as it has become a jest with Hannibal to remember that only two weeks sit between now and when Will’s life becomes his own, the time is far too short for Will’s liking. Ironic, considering how quickly he wants it to pass so he can have the Duke, here, from sun down to sun up, but Will fears his coming of age far more than he lets on.

He drops himself heavily into the bed and picks up the diary once more. It’s a distraction, if anything, but more than that Will has grown tired of waking up with the book pressed firmly to his face as it demands to be read. He’s most of the way through, now, and surprisingly remembers every event described. It’s strangely unsettling to read someone’s life transcribed in their own words, dull and normal as it is, but it’s also a comfort. Will turns the page carefully and starts on another day.

It’s very early morning by the time the book allows itself to be closed and Will lets his fingers run over the cover gently as he meditates on the dust motes by the windows. The writer never lived past twenty-five. His journal remains incomplete decades – perhaps centuries – later under Will’s palm. He had been scared, for the months he wrote in blood, that he was going to die, that once his life was his own, with no one to protect it but himself in his inexperience, it would be swallowed up.

He’d written in blood to get part of himself somewhere else, to give part of himself away so that when he dies, only part of him gets sucked away. It’s a harrowing thought, and Will rolls onto his back, one knee drawn up, thinking. How could someone’s life suddenly just disappear? What could possibly threaten it enough that someone would bind themselves to a book, trying desperately to keep part of themselves away from whatever it was they were afraid of? Will wonders, absently, if it worked.

He dozes as the sun rises over the kingdom, and dreams a now-familiar dream: reaching out to someone he can’t see, red ink spreading on a page as soon as it hits it, only now the ink becomes words that stick, impossible to return to the veins they came from. He wakes slowly and feels groggy, whatever had brought his headache on the previous evening has returned in full force and he wonders if perhaps he caught a chill on the lake; it feels much like a headcold.

Will purses his lips and sighs, a hand against his forehead as he lets his eyes close again and his mind relax. This time when he dreams, it is of the swamp, and of Hannibal pulling forward the little wisp as he had done that night they had ridden there, only now the wisp isn’t a creature in his palm, but Will himself. And despite everything, he knows that to this man, he comes on his own.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The royal affair - as all affairs, royal and otherwise - is discovered and the consequences faced.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A short one this week darlings, and next week... *clicks fingers and vanishes*

When she is angry, the Queen's magic grows stronger. Hannibal should have noticed the lingering touch of her magic worked into his ring, but he had been so distracted by the heavy feel of her magic elsewhere that the low level spell enclosed in the ring of metal had subsided into a base level hum that he was aware of only on a subconscious level. By the time he knew to feel for it, it was too late. She had shut William up in a far tower, and her magic barred Hannibal from even the steps to it. It became invisible to his eyes, a smooth void in the wall, before the castle turned him sharply around and led him back to the grand foyer, no matter how many turns he took away from it. 

This magic was wrought into the stones themselves, humming and alive with her anger. She had struck while they both slept, exhausted from their teasing and rides - and strangely enough she had not turned her anger onto Hannibal himself. He felt drawn in, like a fly in a glass trap.

She no longer hangs from his arm, however. Does not quite treat him with steely silence, outwardly. Her glamours and compulsions no longer settle on his shoulders - she has all the hold she needs locked in the tower that Hannibal cannot enter, and he becomes the ghost in the halls at night, when she does not require him. 

Strangely, however, she seems greatly weakened by the efforts. She looks wan and frail, coughs often. Her sleep is troubled enough that when she finishes with him, he must be cast out or sleep sitting in a chair in what little parts he can get, from her thrashing nightmares. 

It is one of these nights, very near to the Prince's birthday - three days prior, in fact - that he puts the puzzle together. He sits in the chair by the fire, hands folded, fingers beneath his chin in a tight steeple as he thinks. This was not simple jealousy or anger - this was a protection. A resource. A survival instinct.

She intended to eat him.

He might have laughed at the irony, he could have sobbed for the simplicity of it - and his own utter foolishness in missing it this long. He understands the secret to her longevity, to her power here. He knows she must have done it in the past - that was why she was strongest in the castle. Here, boys had grown - their life forces filling the halls they walked in, that they lived and ate and slept within. Then, the instant they became their own - she possessed them and took it, and everything they had filled in the past became hers, more and more strongly.

Hannibal's rage is quiet - and desperate. His time was limited, and every handhold he found disappeared from him. There was only one place her magic did not reach, only one place he could prepare an assault and not be pressed flat under the weight of her magic.

Drawing the ring from his finger, Hannibal sets it very carefully on the mantle, and then rises. He must be very careful - he could not hope to defeat her outright in a contest of wills in her own domain, he knew better than that now. But if he could interject - if he could wait until she was at her weakest, just before she needed to consume her next victim - then he might have a chance. 

He heads for the book tower, and hopes that the castle does not have instructions to bar him from there, as well.

-

Will stops struggling two days into his captivity, finding that the more energy he expended on trying to escape the heavier the stifling sensation grew. That doesn’t stop him beating at the door and yelling until his voice is hoarse. No one may hear him, but he’s certain the Queen’s sleep will be interrupted if she’s listening in.

Since he finished the diary, Will had stepped more carefully in the castle, more determined to get away from it to speak to Hannibal and finding – to both his chagrin and amusement – that the chance to speak was never really offered. The book had not allowed itself to be returned, finding its way under Will’s arm or under his feet until he just placed it on the small bookcase in his room and left it there. He does not forget its contents, even now.

Hannibal had been right about the glamour. About the manipulation and compulsion. And the more Will thinks on it, trapped with nothing more to do than bang his head back against the door in a steady rhythm, the more he realizes that it has been part of his life since before his father died. That the Queen has been controlling him – and his life – for as long as he can remember. It scares him to think that his father died to feed her power and ambition, it hurts him more. He remembers a happy childhood with them both until the Queen had fallen ill.

And then his father had passed and Will’s life had turned into a web of controlled routine.

He doesn’t let himself think much on that. If he does, he’ll panic, and breaking down in a place he can’t get help is not something Will wishes to experience.

He finds he misses Hannibal almost painfully, and for far more than their teasing and sneaking. He misses the man’s words, the way his hands feel against him when he just touches Will to feel his skin, he misses the way his eyes warm just a little when he’s amused, and darken when he’s far from it. He misses his presence in the book tower, in the hall they share, in every aspect of his life. It’s pathetic, in a way, how much he wants to be saved by him. but the closer the days count down to his coming of age, the more Will hopes, and hopes and hopes that Hannibal will find a way to get him out of this.

He wonders if it’s too late to write his life into a journal. Wonders if it’s too late to even spill some into the stones of the castle and have that hold him. he thinks back to his naïve question about believing in magic and its power over a person. But even if that were true, he believes in this. He fears it with all his heart, that the moment his life becomes his own it will be yanked away. He wants to share it. To keep it. To live it, even for a while. 

He lets out another frustrated yell and tugs his hair gently. He has been here two days, and supposes he will be for three more. If he doesn’t starve by then, he hopes that at least one of them – either Hannibal or himself – come up with a plan.

-

The plan is rough, inelegant. It requires very careful working to be certain the magic does not leak to where it can touch the Queen's - her senses are so attuned to him now that he knows she is ready to counter his touch - perhaps to strike back at him when he has poured enough of himself into it, or to strike at Will instead, and then take from Hannibal what she needs instead. His magic is cunning and subtle, not so large a thing as hers - not yet. 

Hannibal had always intended to consume her magic, if he could. He had not expected to be presented with a validation to do so, with as compelling a desire to accomplish it even at risk. What he had intended as a slow insinuation and observation he had found a roiling mass of unease beneath, churning below the peaceful surface.

Had she not attempted to charm him, to cast her magic tight and sticky over him, he might have felt a twinge of guilt for the original lie, for the intent of betrayal, but now he is only determined.   
There has always been some old magic here that has kept her out, whether by her choice or an aversion, it was a weak point in her armor. The tower welcomes him in, the books shuffle against his fingers like neglected animals seeking comfort in the absence of their owner. Hannibal knows he is poor substitute for what they want. 

Instead he reaches down beneath the surface magic that animates them, finds the will that has seeped into the cracks - he has not seen the journal, but this sort of inanimate animation was the product of a lingering soul. The threads of magic are old, and he must handle them carefully, he shores them up with his own will and his own magic and pulls them together, yanks and manipulates until he has the shape he wants. 

A doorway of fluttering pages and woven from the breath of the old soul still lingering in its ties here, a last sigh of magic from the power of blood - but he had asked of it, not demanded - had given as much of his own power as he could spare to help it along, and still when the door of books springs open, he has nothing to spare to dampen the magic that repels him back hard against the wall behind, though the books catch him. Beyond the doorway is a short stair, and at the top of it is the only window in Will's tower.

If he only has faith enough to step through. 

-

Two lives. That’s what Will’s father had told him, they have two lives until they start living, then they have only one. Will sits still, curled by the door with his head in his hands and eyes wide as though he’ll be able to see the answer if he just looks deep enough into nothing. What does it mean? What could it possibly mean to have only one life once you start living it?

He thinks back to the journal, how the narrator had spent so long meticulously incorporating his one life into a book, as though sharing it would make him immune to destruction. As though it not belonging to him was the only way to keep it safe.

Will jumps just a little when something knocks against the window. It’s a single thing, loud and quick, as though a bird had flown into the glass and then continued on its way, but it’s too high for most birds. He stretches his legs in front of him and frowns at the window. It’s not yet night but twilight is seeping the day from the world rapidly. There’s another knock and Will stands, taking the three strides necessary to get to the window and looking out. And it takes a moment before what he sees actually makes sense.

There are six books, perhaps seven that rest in mid-air between his window and a doorway that Will is fairly certain did not exist when he checked the view that morning. For a long moment he just stares, and then the book closest to the glass nudges against it and Will just laughs.

“It’s like a fairytale.” He mumbles, pulling open the window and looking around to see what he can use to stand on to climb out. nothing presents itself, the tower is extraordinarily bare, so Will huffs out a breath and hoists himself to the windowsill, balancing there carefully before shifting so his feet hang out of the tower and rest gently on the book. It doesn’t have a solid grounding, it dips a little under his weight, and for a moment Will refuses to rest all his weight against it. it’s a long fall, far enough that everything beyond the edge of the book seems blurred.

But he can’t stay in the tower forever.

Will closes his eyes tight and forces himself to stand up, finding that if he moves slowly, the book supports his weight well and doesn’t dip precariously. It’s when he opens his eyes and realizes he has six more to walk over that sets the hollow vertigo in his chest. Will lets out a slow breath and steps to the next one.

It’s slow going but never once does Will feel unstable enough to fall off. The books hold steady and the door gets closer, and he leaps from the last to the portal and finds himself pressed against a warm familiar chest, his feet on solid ground again. behind him, the doorway closes off and the books scatter to the floor, exhausted.

Hannibal breathes a faint thanks into the air, knowing he will have more to ask of the lingering magic here, and nearly exhaust his own before this is over, but with the door closed the pressure repelling him from the tower eases and instead he finds the Prince leaning into him - solid, real, alive. He settles his arms around Will's shoulders.

"There you are," he says, and he realizes he does not know what he would have done if the Queen had been crueller and chained him into his tower. He does not think she would have outright hurt him - not before her intention to consume his life wholesale - or Hannibal's instead, should she have to use her pet as a hostage. It does not matter, in this exact second.

But he finds himself seeking harm anyway, tipping Will's head back to look into his eyes, running his hands gently down his back, over his sides - simply making sure he is whole. He looks sleepless and unfed, but uninjured. The first two can be remedied, with time. The last would have been more difficult. 

Will smiles into the touch and stays still, lets Hannibal do what he needs until his hands calm against him and Will can push up and kiss him gently, a chaste thing, in reassurance.

"I'm sorry it took me so long - I was not certain of her plan until just today and I didn't want to risk stepping wrong." A failure - any effort, in fact, that she noticed, would have resulted in direct retaliation, against him or Will he wasn't sure. It was an effective leash.

Will just shakes his head. The fact that he tried, that he managed, the fact that his body is relaxing for the first time since he was locked away is enough to have him happy. Enough to make him press closer… and remind him.

“She wants my life, doesn’t she?” he pulls back and frowns a little, “She wants my life when it’s my own so I can’t have it.”

It slowly makes sense. Why the journal was written for so long, and why the effort had cost so much pain. He was trying to do what the Queen wanted to do to Will: take the life away so no one else could have it.

"Yes," Hannibal answers, letting his hands fall. "It's the reason why her power doesn't diminish when she expends it - she restores it." Periodically, Hannibal suspected. She took what she needed from others - as every magician did to an extent. Hannibal drew from existing spells, better at attracting and consuming magic than he was at expending it. 

“What if it’s not mine anymore, then where will she get it?” Will could hide it away, set it aside and pretend like it had never come into his possession at all. He looks at Hannibal, heart hammering and smile slowly widening. He had power. Perhaps not as strong or invasive as the Queen’s but he had brought Will here.

“Hannibal, how would I hide it?”

The question is a good one - a very wise one. Hannibal draws back, settling. He is clearly exhausted by his efforts - and he knows they aren't over for the night. He will have to repeat the spell, will have to give more the second time. "She already has it, in effect," he explains, gently. "But every spell has terms. Everything this powerful must have a weakness. You could try to bind yourself - but unless it is in the way the spell calls for as a reversal, it will only weaken the effects."

The seconds of time it might buy Hannibal, however, while the Queen was at her weakest...

"I intend to defend you," he suggests, looking up. Here was where it got delicate. "I can take magic - pull it in and make it mine. The difficulty is that she has made this her domain. She is stronger than I am - even still, as her power wains for want of replenishment."

He spreads his hands. "In the moment where she is weakest - when she comes for you - I can strike." 

But it isn't without complications or difficulties. If he is not strong enough, they'll both fail. If there isn't enough time for him to act - well, she will be distracted and it's possible he'll ultimately succeed, but it won't help William. And - he feels the need to be utterly transparent. "It will kill her."

Will watches the way Hannibal’s face changes, how he keeps calm and collected as he always is, but something about his words hits in a way Will doesn’t like. It’s the last words that make him frown and step back. Would he use him as bait? Wait until the Queen got what she wanted and then take her power – and then Will’s along with it? He shakes his head and steps back a little more so he can lean against the opposite wall.

“That’s why you came?” he asks after a moment, “Hungry for power just as she is?”

It hurts, even saying the words, thinking them, hurts. But Will is far from patient after his days locked away and he refuses to just let the comment lie without explanation. Will isn’t angry, he’s too tired to be angry, too confused and feeling too betrayed to be anything but deeply sad. He’d thought there was something, anything, between them that meant something, but apparently it was just another distraction, a compulsion without the effort expended on magic to keep him blind.

"That's why I came," Hannibal answers. "And because she invited me, and I thought she would seek to do the same." It isn't the truth anymore, but when Hannibal looks up, he can see it hardly matters. The betrayal is still real, that the Prince has grown too tired of it to even rage. Hannibal doesn't expect that to affect him as it does - but having seen Will begin to flex into his power, begin to possess himself, seeing this surrender and defeat is painful.

“What will you do after she’s dead?” Will asks quietly, “After I am?”

"I never intended to take your power," Hannibal answers. "I only freed you from hers."

From the moment anger had sprung up in him enough to risk discovery when he'd torn her webs of soothing, becalming magic that dulled Will's mind and shuttered his spirit, Hannibal had never intended him harm. He had perhaps done it to the Prince, if it turned out he couldn't protect him. He had had more curiosity than truly good intentions, so he makes no attempt to defend himself. 

"If I can stop it, William, I will," Hannibal says instead, and he displays his palms. "Otherwise, I could have left you as you were and still accomplished my purpose." 

If he means the tower, or bespelled and benumbed, it's unclear - but it is the truth either way.

Will lets the words sink in, meditates on them but doesn’t speak. He could have left Will alone, could have ignored him and gone about his own cruel plans. But are they really cruel, when all they are are a protection against the same? A self defense? He assumes Hannibal will stay to rule the kingdom once the Queen is dead – killed. Or perhaps he’ll move on, find another, and feed off of that one as well. He shakes his head – and the thought away.

“Is that why you wanted to wait?” he asks, lifting his head, “So she could think my life would be hers for the taking when she came for it?”

"No," the answer comes, honest and quiet. "It was a risk either way - drawing you in. I thought she wanted what I had, and before your life is yours it can be used against me." He exhales, makes eye contact across the space that was solely theirs - theirs and whatever was writ into the stones by spilled blood and long hours of occupation. By what had been denied the Queen before. 

"And I wanted to test you," he says - he'd been a fool. "Test both of us. I was lost in it." Foolish and stupid to be drawn in and distracted. Surely he hadn't calculated this far, but it's impossible to say it isn't going to help. "I won't say I'm not grateful now."

It’s very dark outside now, the night fallen quickly, and once midnight strikes there will be just two days until Will comes of age. Two days until he’s either dead or betrayed and Will isn’t sure which he’d prefer. He thinks of how Hannibal had warned him, told him about the glamours, about the compulsion, and how Will had taken it all into stride but had never applied it to himself practically. If anything this is a betrayal he should have seen coming.

“If you don’t want my life, what do you want from me?” Will asks, and realizes that everything hangs on the answer. He needs to know if what they had was a diversion, if his captivity was planned as a distraction, if he was meant to be used as bait, if the Queen thought there was something there. He realizes, also, that if Hannibal tells him this means something, he will believe him.

"Magically, nothing. Selfishly, forgiveness. Practically - your help." Hannibal knows this will not come easy, that nothing he says will write this any cleaner on the page. He could reach out and compel Will to accept, to forget it, to comply. But then he would be just as bad as the Queen. "But I won't force you to give it to me."

Will’s lips purse gently, the bottom one pushing up before he parts them on a sigh and turns away. He believes him, that’s what frightens Will the most. He believes him and is prepared to give what Hannibal asks, though he doubts he’ll be much help locked in a tower. He nods, just once, but doesn’t say anything.

Hannibal stands up, and he goes to William. He doesn't look desperate or scared or anything but firm and determined. He takes the Prince's hand and then goes down on his knees. "I want you to take your life as your own. It wasn't what I came to do, but it's what I intend now. The rest you'll have to judge yourself."

By the rules, William was too young to be in possession of such power - such ability to judge - but only just barely so. He was already unfolding, already stretching his limits. "If you want, you are free to go now. To find your own way. I suspect our chances are better together."

Will swallows and turns his hand to fold his fingers with Hannibal’s. He could run, now, they technically both could. But what would they become then, but two men hiding from a magic neither is powerful enough to counter? Will doesn’t know what he wants once his life is his, but the idea of running with it, keeping it as tethered and protected as his entire life before has been is not something he wants, not now.

“Should I even try to protect it?” he asks quietly, sinking down to join Hannibal kneeling on the floor. He brings their hands to rest on his lap and just looks at them, joined and comfortable and warm. “I doubt binding my life to the stones will keep her from taking it. perhaps keep her from taking it all, but she will still use it to grow.”

He looks up, blue eyes searching brown, before he blinks.

"Of course you should fight for it, William," Hannibal says. "Perhaps not by binding it to stones." Inexplicably, he finds ease with the knowledge that Will wasn't going to reject him outright, though he had admitted the truth of what he was and why he was here. He doubts it's fully over, or that he'll never hear of it again. Pulling his lower lip into his mouth, Hannibal considers what he knows of such magic. It was an old sort.

“Magically I can offer you nothing. Practically, I will play the bait if that is what you need me to do.” Will offers a small, crooked smile before parting his lips on a breath, “And forgiveness is not something you have to ask of me.”

"Her power will be weakest, and my chances greatest if she believes nothing is awry until the moment she intends to take your life," Hannibal answers. He makes no move to reclaim his hands, but his eyes are distant, clearly he is in thought. If he can overcome her, the increase to his own abilities will be great enough that it's unlikely he'll have much to worry about, aside from William, and whatever weaknesses he inherited from the Queen's power.

The thought is slow to come, sitting at the back of his mind. "How did this tower escape her control?" he asks, considering. He can feel the will that remains here, the ghost. Someone found a way - but binding with blood hadn't done it. What was stronger? Only the heart itself. "You must find something that you can allow to hold you as much as you hold it."

He does not volunteer himself - it would presume, it would feel calculated and manipulative and it would change both of them forever. "Don't pick hastily," he warns. "A poorly chosen bond will fail instead of holding strong, and by nature they will change you." 

That wasn't magic but humanity - who hadn't been changed by love, in some capacity?

Will thinks, considers, gently runs his thumb over the back of Hannibal’s knuckles in silence. In truth, he has no idea how the tower escaped the Queen’s control. He has been coming to it since he was a boy, first to explore as much as he could, then because he liked the space. It was his space. Until Hannibal found it, no one else knew it was here. Perhaps that was why. The Queen couldn’t control what she could not see, what she does not know about.

And perhaps that’s the only way to defeat her.

Will knows he should go. Knows that his presence will be missed if it’s out of the tower for long enough. and he’s frustrated with how close he is to finding the answer, how desperately close, and how he’s too tired to see it properly. Instead he sits forward and presses his lips to Hannibal’s again.

“Everything will change me.” he says quietly, gently brushing his nose against the man’s cheek, “In two days I won’t be myself. Or, perhaps, I will be more myself than I have been.” He smiles and pulls back just enough to see him. He doesn’t want to go. Not yet. He’s hungry and sore from the cold floor of the tower, and exhausted in every way, and he knows as soon as he returns to his prison the ache of missing Hannibal will add to the strain.

He doesn’t tell him. just lets out a soft breath and bites his lip gently before kissing him again.

“I should go.”

Hannibal finally lifts his hands out of the hold William has on them, and settles them around Will's shoulders and pulls him close, to feel the weight against him, solid and living. Hannibal strokes gently at his cheeks, curling his hands tenderly against Will's face, at his neck. It's absent, just the way William had wanted Hannibal to do - when things had been simpler. Move without thinking, because he was driven to - without even the faintest whisper of magic.

"You should go," Hannibal agrees again, but he doesn't want to let him. He kisses Will again, longer this time, then says, "You will be missed."

By the Queen's magic, and by Hannibal himself. 

He draws himself up to begin the magic again, helps Will to his feet as well. "Only two more days. She will come to you early, and I will be just behind her. Be strong, find something to hold onto in your heart."

He exhales a sigh, reaches for the magic - the tower feels sore and stretched when he touches it to ask, and he promises to shore up its efforts with whatever it needs. The magic is tender when he begins to work it, and he knows it will exhaust him to hold the door for very long. The corner of his mouth quirks, he reaches up to push his fingers through Will's hair, and reminds, "From sunset to sunrise. I did promise."

Will nods and watches, awed, as Hannibal opens the doorway again, as the books flutter and sort and arrange themselves to help. He runs his hands over the ones he can reach, the ones not moving, in silent gratitude, and steps through, fingers lingering on the arch before he moves through to walk the seven floating books back to his tower. He doesn’t take longer than he needs, and just as he crawls through the window to sit on the sill, the portal vanishes.

That night Will doesn’t sleep. He lies flat against the tower floor an directs his eyes to the windows, waiting for the sun to come up and waiting for courage to rise just as surely. He trusts Hannibal with his life, with the life he himself has never experienced yet, and it’s as terrifying as it is exhilarating. He thinks about his father, and how he had died sharing his life with another. He thinks of the boy whose journal he read, of how desperately he had tried to keep himself alive by doing just the same thing, and then it hits him.

A life can be taken if it’s shared, the part that’s in you can still be used, consumed. Just like it had been with the boy in the journal, his life partly on the pages but mostly his own. Like it had been with his father, who had given half his life to the first woman he loved, who bore him a son, and half to the woman that ended up killing him. Sharing a life was not the answer, and hiding it between lines on a page wouldn’t help.

A life needs to be completely given over.

The thought makes Will tremble, and he closes his eyes as the sun starts to rise. That morning is the first time food and water is sent up to him, and he sleeps well enough after to not let the terrifying thought cloud his mind again.

He dreams of red ink, and foxfires, gentle words, and when he reaches out into the abyss, Hannibal’s hand takes his own.

-

Hannibal rests - if the Queen knows that Will was out of the tower the previous evening, she gives no sign, and the expenditure of magic tires him enough - the need to rebuild it as quickly as possible - distracts him to a point where he must settle in and rest. He does not often dream, but this time he does, and it's of a white raven carrying a raw, red heart into the mist, flapping powerful wings and laughing in a bird's chuckle.

When he wakes it's with the certainty that he has slept too much, too long, has missed something important and he jolts awake, lurches from the chair where he has slept long and stiffly. A quick mental check, a brief glance at the tall grandfather clock suggests he has either slept an entire day, or only three hours. 

Neither would truly surprise him. The Queen is not in her chambers, and he sits up straight and reaches out for her, finds her in the garden and he is relieved. 

He makes his way down the stairs, feeling sluggish and unprepared to face her, feeling the oppressive weight of the castle watching him and reporting back to her his every movement. He is worried at the state of recovery his magic is in - everything depends on his strength. 

Outside, she is sitting, and at first he has little idea what the large black shape surrounding her is, and then he realizes it is Winston, laid down with his head heavy in her lap, apparently asleep. He experiences a moment of anger, a moment of blind fury almost until he sees the horse breathe, and then he realizes the moment was orchestrated for him, orchestrated to show how much power she has over even something he has invested so much of himself in.

She knows the horse isn't his, that it is William's, and the metaphor is not lost to him.

"Did you always know?" he asks, standing with his hands behind his back as she works her fingers through the wavy black mane. 

"Hmm," she seems to think about it, her long pretty nails leaving a trail through the dark mane. "I suspected - I hoped you would have some magic when I sent word to you. And then I felt how hungry your magic was - I knew you from the instant I saw you."

Her blue eyes look up, but her hand never stills. "I thought you would appreciate all the effort that went into the Prince, not try and deprive me of it. And to think all it took to change his young mind was gifts and charm. I need not have spent so much magic if only I could have manipulated him as you did."

She sighs, an affectation. "Then again, what kind of chance did I have? I was nearly his mother. Beautiful as I am, I suppose he will never see it." When her fingers encounter a snag in the mane, she simply yanks the offending hairs free. The horse does not stir, and she shakes the snarl free of her fingers, lets it fall to the soft earth.

"You're a little thing, a young thing when compared to me, Duke," she continues, touching the horse's ears, pushing her palm over the darkly furred cheek and the closed eye. "Do not think to challenge me on this. Let it happen, Hannibal. We have great potential, you and I together. Your hungry magic and my overwhelming power of life."

Hannibal does not answer, but when he whistles, sharply, and pulls at her magic it comes away and the horse lurches up to his feet and returns to his hand. Her look of fury lasts only a moment before he turns and leaves the yard, pulling in the last trails of bewitchment that she had laid over the horse, and taking the power out of them for his own. Beyond that, she will get nothing from him.

Soon enough they would find out the results.

-

Time races and stands still for the Queen, but she watches - she tracks every move the Duke makes and sees nothing but him sitting still - and she feeds him nothing, risks nothing that he might pull into himself and make his own. They are both conserving power, right up until the last second - but her advantage is that she knows where the Prince is hidden, that the castle will open for her, and not for anyone else. 

They both have eyes on the clock, they both are still as spiders done spinning, just gathering what they can to their bodies and holding it tight. Hannibal does not return to her quarters, and she cannot decide if he is genuinely compelled by William, or if the man wants that power for himself, now that he has seen how the idea works in her mind. 

When the hour nears she stands. She does not dare extend her power to feel out where he has gone in the castle. If he finds a way into the tower, she will stop him. If he does not, it does not matter - when her power is renewed, he will be next - for daring to resist her in the first place.

She calls the door to her, and it appears - and up she climbs, to find the Prince in the tower.

-

The two days crawl for Will. He spends his time pacing the tower, opening the window wide and leaning out far, no intention of jumping, but needing a thrill of some sort to keep his mind alive and active. Food and water come regularly now, three times a day. Perhaps the first two had simply been part of the punishment on their own, to show just what could be taken away from him. He thinks on Hannibal’s words and tries to steel himself, though fear still bubbles up inside and keeps Will restless.

Just before the dawn of his twenty-fifth birthday, Will watches from the windowsill, one leg hanging over the seemingly endless drop, the other countering the balance inside the tower. He hasn’t slept, for fear of never waking up if the Queen chooses to take his life as easily and similarly as she had taken his freedom. He thinks. He wonders. And he hopes that Hannibal’s promise is not a false one, that he will indeed be just behind the Queen, just in time to save him.

When the door opens, Will doesn’t flinch, but he does retract his leg from outside and swing himself down to stand on the floor properly. He straightens his shoulders and refrains from bowing when he sees his stepmother, despite how used he is to doing so in her presence. She doesn’t press the issue, just watching her stepson in silence.

“You’re not scared of me.” she comments, hands pressed gently together in front of her, unthreatening for the moment. Will just blinks.

“Perhaps you could say I’m hateful towards you.” He responds, though his tone is just as calm and quiet as hers. He can’t see Hannibal beyond the door, it makes his heart hammer a little more prominently in his chest.

“You want to steal my life from me.”

The Queen shakes her head. “You don’t see it like I do, William.” She murmurs, “You see it as a violation, an ending. When it is anything but. Within me you will live forever, Will. No wasted opportunities. No fear of failure. Your life will be fuelling another, what nobler act of courage is there than to allow that?”

Will shakes his head, finding that he can’t step back further than he already stands against the cold stone wall.

“Is that what you told my father?” he asks, “That you will make him immortal?”

“Your father was an unfortunate loss to me.” the Queen says, and for a moment, Will believes her. her eyes lower and she sighs, as though back in the memory of that time. “But the one before him found a way to weaken me, I needed another.”

Will frowns, lips parted as though to speak, but silent instead in thought. Then he blinks.

“The diary.”

“Blood, once removed, is impossible to return, William. He was weak when I consumed him and weakened me. Your father has kept me company all these years, with me as surely as if he were by my side. And I can offer you the same, Will.”

“Why do you deserve it?” he asks, trembling now. Hannibal has not appeared, he can’t feel him or see him or sense him, and it terrifies Will. “Why do you deserve to live forever through others’ sacrifices?” he swallows thickly and shakes his head. “You do not deserve my life. And you cannot have it.”

The Queen just smiles, a sad, gentle thing as though she’s talking to a much younger Will, a Will who asks if he can befriend the goblins in his storybooks, a Will who begs and pleads for her to ride out to the river with him just so he can see the stars reflected in it in summer. And when she looks up, Will closes his eyes, unable to keep the image there, unable to look into the face of the person he had loved and admired for so many years in his youth, who has come to betray him now.

“My sweet Will,”

Will bites his lip, pressing back against the cold solid tower, the only support he has, and hopes, prays, that wherever Hannibal is he’s safe, that he’ll take her power once she’s taken Will’s, so that Will can live within him forever, as his father lived within the Queen. So he can be by his side even if it’s only through memory and thought. His heart hammers and Will hopes. With every heartbeat he wishes.

And behind them, the dawn lights the earth with its warmth, and Will’s life becomes his own.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's dawn, and Will's life is his own.
> 
> ...in theory.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You are all wonderful for enjoying this with us, it's been an awesome ride.
> 
> It would be great to hear your feedback on this (as always) and to maybe see you read some of our other stuff <3 stay awesome, we love you!

Hannibal can only gain entrance to the tower at the moment her guard is lowest. It's the diary that leads him - it had leapt into his hands from Will's shelf in his quarters, pushed against his chest like an affectionate cat, and he had understood. The key to the tower, the books that lived and fluttered there, the last traces of magic. The Queen would ebb further this time, though she had taken the Prince's father, because his life would have been divided - expended partially, given over to his first wife, to his son. It would leave her weaker in these moments.

But he still needed to get to her, and the book is his key - it's still got some link in the blood, to what she had managed to take. "Help me," he asks it, and lends his will to open the way. It is a struggle, it's a hell of an expense of magic when he knows he will still need whatever he can get. 

The way fights him, wavers, he can feel the Queen on the other side of it, can feel the pages fluttering against his fingers as they both fight, and then - in the moment of her ultimate distraction, though Hannibal's heart nearly drops out of him to consider what that might mean, they are through. He races up the stairs, and there seem to be so many, an endless turn of them, up and up until he reaches the top.

This time, she sits with a dark maned head in her lap, patting a form that's still and quiet. Hannibal's fingers lose feeling, the book slips from them and he's reaching for his magic before he thinks, opening wider than he has in the past to pull in anything that touches, and when she stands, the Prince's body slides down to the floor and does not move. 

Hannibal's heart has opened like a black hole, dropped away like a stone fallen down a well, and it's still almost not enough, even as he pulls in everything that comes near him, consumes it in brilliant magical light as the Queen reaches toward him and tries to get enough grip to twist him into just the right shape, to bend him and make the hole within him into her own.

He has almost lost enough of himself to go, he discovers, in just the few instants it had taken him to process what he had seen when he opened the door. He had been too late, in the instants after dawn, too late - and now what did it truly matter. He is slipping inch by inch into her grasp - but in the instant before she might have him, something steals her balance.

It is so surprising Hannibal almost does not push, but he is so hollow that it happens anyway, that when she stumbles, when the magic she expects and reaches for slips her hold and then simply isn't there, Hannibal pulls instinctively. It pours, like he has broken a dam, rushes into his possession like a wave, like a horse running past and it is all he can do to reach up and try to seize it, and the shock of grabbing it jars through him. 

The Queen stills, eyes wide in both disbelief and sudden terror that the one thing she’d reached for, the one thing she had gathered, and taken in, is slipping through her fingers like rain, passing through her skin to the man in front of her and taking the rest of her power with it. the life she had pulled from William, the life she needed, was not hers to control. Was not his. In the one moment that he had, Will had given his life to another, and it was returning to its home.

When it tames, it eases into Hannibal’s hold, and after long moments where he is unaware of the world, it becomes his. When he blinks aware again, the power shifts under his hold, but does not rise against him. He steps over the Queen, and reaches for the Prince she had left crumpled on the floor - he knows what he will find, he knows, but he must be certain.

He kneels by Will, hand turning to gently brush the backs of his knuckles over the warm skin of his face, to let his thumb touch his lips, still parted on a breath even though he feels none there now. Hannibal sighs and draws Will up against him as he’d found him with the Queen, relaxed as though in sleep, pliant as a rag doll as he cards his fingers through Will’s soft hair.

The magic settles, no longer roiling but exploring, finding its place within its new master, and Hannibal lets it be. It will be useless against the death in his hands. Like blood drying on a page, spreading into it, it cannot be retrieved. And what tugs at Hannibal the most, is that he promised, and Will had believed him. Had probably died still believing.

He brings his forehead to rest against Will’s, letting his eyes close and his breathing slow, and just holds him, thumb stroking the skin at his temple. If he had known, if he had even imagined that he wouldn’t make it, that he’d break his promise, he would have given Will more. Had made him run, had come with him. Had found a way to bind himself to Will, to stay. But he hadn’t. He had believed in his ability to make it.

He wishes he had volunteered himself after all. A life for a life.

When he kisses Will it’s light, a gentle brush of lips and nothing more. An apology. But when he moves away Will follows, chest rising on a deep breath, neck arching back to accommodate. When he blinks his eyes open they’re confused, frantic, until they settle on Hannibal, and then Will smiles, lips parting wider on a grin.

“It worked,” he breathes, eyes bright and wet, and he laughs, a breathless quiet thing, before pulling Hannibal close again. “I knew it would work.”

There is a moment of disbelief, then simply, honest, unmuted relief. Hannibal shakes his head, once, and then finds himself reassuring himself that what he's seeing is real - Will's cheeks, his skin. Touching his neck, and then putting his palm flat over the man's chest and feeling his heart beat.

It is real, by every sense he gets - Will is alive and warm. Hannibal has to sit back to keep from collapsing, but he pulls William with him, settles the Prince in his lap against his chest and just holds on while he tries to have a single coherent thought. 

"What," he asks at last, lifting his hands and rubbing his eyes, trying to catch up with how much has happened, how things have turned on their heads, and turned on their heads again fast enough to leave him dizzy, if the struggle hadn't been enough to do so already. "Did you do, exactly?"

Even as he asks, however, he has an idea. He waits to hear it in Will's voice instead.

Will smiles, expression gentle, a mixture of absolute relief and joy.

“I chose.” He said, “I chose to give my life to someone who would hold it for me, safe. If it wasn’t mine when she took it, she wouldn’t be able to use it.” It had not been a well thought-out plan, not at all, it had been a panic and an instinct, the last wish, and the first. “You told me to find something I can allow to hold me as much as I hold it." he swallows gently, “I supposed you’d have to do.”

He strokes his hands over Hannibal in the same disbelief, the same seeking frantic way Hannibal had touched him; fingers gentle in his hair, down the line of his jaw and lower to rest against his collarbone. His eyes follow the motion, heart beating quick and alive and making Will feel giddy. Making him, in fact, feel everything.

"That was very dangerous," Hannibal suggests - but wise in its own way. Perhaps it was only that strength - given willingly to Hannibal - that had let him prevail. He does not know how the battle would have felt or gone had he not had strength from despair and William both, but he knows how it went with both conditions intact, and it's a relief. Hannibal smiles, curls his arms around Will and holds him tight, close. 

For the first time in a long time, Will breathes without feeling stifled. He knows that if he so chose, he could leave the castle and not feel the tug to come back. He knows that if he pulls Hannibal into a kiss, that nothing and no one will stop them.

So he does, curling one hand around his shoulders and gently cupping the back of his head to hold him still. Smiling into it, feeling how the man reciprocates by parting his lips, by curling his own arms around Will to hold him closer, to press them together.

“Do we have to wait till sundown?” he asks, pulling away just enough to see Hannibal properly, and grins.

Hannibal laughs, faintly. "For you to possess me, no," he says, honestly. "I suppose you have for some time." After all, he had been his own to give when they'd met - even though Hannibal had dragged his feet and tried to deny it, tried to hold back. 

"As for the rest..." He shifts to get up, and his movements are slow, tired, faintly sore. "No, but the results might be more pleasing if we both got some rest and..."

There are things to attend, difficulties. The Queen has ceased to exist - run to dust in a dress, that shifts away out the window. "I suppose you'll need crowning." 

It was likely to be the wisest course they could take - the people would react more positively to a known entity than an interloper, and Hannibal has...Hannibal has acquired the sort of power he came for, and to tie himself down as sole ruler of two kingdoms would likely slowly destroy him. When they are both standing, Hannibal curls his hands against Will's neck, slides his thumbs softly under his chin and tilts his head up to kiss him.

"Sundown to sunup," he promises. "and I will lend us privacy."

-

It turns into a very strange day. It appeared that the Queen’s magic reached further, even, than anyone suspected, and more and more people found themselves waking from the magical lethargy Will had been freed from by Hannibal two weeks before. Arrangements are started – far too many to complete in a single day – but the important ones are seen through. William’s coronation is announced for the next afternoon, Hannibal’s status as consort transferred by choice of both parties.

It’s late afternoon by the time either of them even have a chance to eat. They take their meal privately, exhausted but still smiling like children. Will has never felt more alive, never so energetic and free. He supposes when the time finally comes, he will sleep like the dead, perhaps have the first restful sleep in years. But for the moment he is content to enjoy discovering who he is, and finding he’s not much different. Happier, for certain, but the adoration Hannibal had feared would pass with Will’s coming of age hasn’t. If anything, it’s grown from more than just affection, to something far deeper.

By sundown, Will is buzzing, and he waves off any more arrangements and meetings until the following day. When he makes his way down their shared hall, he hesitates, unsure which chamber to enter. After a pause of indecision he selects his own and smiles when he sees Hannibal is already inside. He closes the door quietly and steps closer, remembering clearly the teasing threats the man had made back in the tower, what feels like a lifetime ago, of what he would do to Will when he had him.

Hannibal has the diary in his lap, like a favored pet, settled in the easychair by the fireplace as he was, with his hand laid over the cover. If there was one thing he wanted to take care of, it was to return the rest of what was bound in these pages to the journal and the tower - he could not unbind the will entirely - spilt blood written out could not be returned to the veins form which it poured.

But he could give this, reunite all the parts and leave them whole in the tower where the former Prince had long ago made refuge.

When Will enters, he taps his fingers once, in promise to finish the last of it later - he had a standing promise, in fact, so he must be forgiven the delay, and sets the book aside in the chair as he rises from it. 

For a moment he looks like he would like to hesitate, to draw himself up in his composure and take advantage of the lost, but expectant smile on Will's features. The fact that Hannibal - for perhaps the last time, in surrendering control of the kingdom and part of his own will, will truly have the upper hand. The instant William knows all he needs do is ask, Hannibal suspects his days will at least never cease to be interesting.

But instead, Hannibal crosses the space, lifts his magic against the door and finds the castle itself answering, leaving the space muffled - not that he is ashamed, but perhaps the sounds that emerge might be considered inappropriate for mourning...

He pulls Will against him and kisses the man, relieved to have him real and solid and wholly there. Devoted. When they need to breathe, Hannibal breaks at last with a smile that is very faintly wicked. 

"What was it I promised again?"

“That you would see me undone.” Will replies easily, smiling. It’s a strange feeling, knowing that his life is his own but does not belong to him. He has given it up completely and doesn’t feel as compelled, or as controlled, as he had been throughout his entire life with the Queen. He chews his lip before his smile darkens to match Hannibal’s, the anticipation cresting until he lets out a breath and steps past him, turning just enough to let Hannibal’s hands slide down his arms and off. And then he walks away, bringing up one hand to undo the first few buttons of his shirt as he waits to see if Hannibal will follow.

With the amount of teasing they have both endured, both enjoyed before the captivity, Will feels himself grinning. He can feel the magic subtly around him in a way that isn’t intrusive, just present, and it feels warm, feels familiar and comfortable. Like the magic in the tower, something he can’t control but something he feels is welcoming more than controlling. Then again, it is Hannibal’s magic, not the Queen’s.

“Do I only have you till sun up?” he asks, an unnecessary question but one he feels he has to ask before his mind goes wandering. When he turns, he tilts his head and tugs another button free, a nearly unconscious movement as he waits.

Hannibal is careful not to cloak the magic too tightly about them, but to press it out to the edges of the room. Will's smile is evidence that he's done well, and Hannibal arches his eyebrows at the question. He knows it is only teasing, and he finds it is a relief to not have to consider leaving Will behind in the morning simply to avoid detection. They truly have their leisure. 

"Are you politely suggesting I be gone in the morning?" he asks, and he tucks his hands behind his back as he watches Will undress - wondering if he would like the chance to try and pull Hannibal to him, as he had seemed to want in some of their prior teasing. Hannibal huffs out an amused sound, his eyes dark, watching William work his own buttons.

"By the terms of our deal," Hannibal continues, drawing his back straight, leaving his hands behind and held together to keep them from straying. His expression is amused, however, heavy lidded and invested in Will's motions. "Did you care to re-negotiate? I will ask a price, of course."

“You would ask a price of a Prince?” Will replies, his smile growing as he finishes with his shirt and lets it hang open from his shoulders. Hannibal, in fact, can ask anything of this Prince, and get it. But Will refrains from reminding him. instead he steps back, once, twice, and lets the back of his knees hit the bed.

There are lanterns around the room, a few by his window, some on the tables near his bed where his books usually rest. The only other light is the fireplace, a warm orange glow that seeps into Will’s bones. Then he sinks to the bed and rests back comfortably, eyes closing gently as he licks his lips and parts them.

“You promised to push me down,” he recites quietly, tone like silk, “To stroke until I begged, until I didn’t know what I wanted.” Will bites his lip lightly and keeps his eyes closed for the moment. Then he hums, allows a smile to spread, and leans down to unlace his boots. “Perhaps I should see if you can keep to the original terms before I agree to pay for more?”

Hannibal follows after, just a step behind, his fingers finally uncurling from themselves to undo the fancy flush of lace at his throat, to work open the heavy, black brocade coat. "A wise first decision as king," Hannibal reminds him - perhaps to emphasize his own boldness at asking further payment for an extension of what he has promised.

The boots come off easily enough, and Will pushes himself back until he’s lying crossways on the bed, head over the side of the bed away from Hannibal, where he can’t see him, and draws his knee up. he remembers that night in the tower. How he had begged, whimpered, writhed under Hannibal’s hands. He remembers how much he wanted, and how casually Hannibal had denied him. Will stays as he is, neck arched back over the mattress, seeing the room upside down and only imagining where Hannibal is within it where he can’t see, and brings a hand down to carefully tug the cord of his pants, the knot sticking a moment before drawing free.

Warm hands descend to cover Will's, to pull them aside, and Hannibal it seems has lost his own boots, his own coat and the shirt beneath when he settles over Will and takes over the untying of his pants. Hannibal wants to tease, certainly, but not deny - they have both waited, they are both sure by now.

With the laces undone, Hannibal settles on his knees on the bed and runs his palms up the soft skin of Will's stomach, over his chest along the collar bones, up the yielding skin of the undersides of his biceps. He touches too, the arched neck left bared to him, where he fixes his mouth beneath the point of chin. The skin is soft and vulnerable, but when he presses it between his teeth it is gentle enough not to sting. 

Taking his time, he traces over the skin, his hands skirting where Will likely wants him most - but not so teasingly this time, with the sense that this will come to completion, as Hannibal runs his thumbs into the crease where thigh joins body, and then turns his hand to cup a palm low against Will's cock and run it up, feeling him grow harder into his touch.

It’s slow and aching and Will sighs, lips parting as he lets his eyes slip to half-mast, head still back, not yet looking at Hannibal as he touches him. And he can feel everything, the way his hold lingers, touching every part of Will he can reach, as though learning him properly, the way his teeth close gently over skin, enough for Will’s breathing to come a little louder before he swallows and licks his lips before they part again.

He finds he doesn’t want to rush him, as much as he wants Hannibal’s words to become actions. He can wait. They have time. And he is certain that whatever price Hannibal asks for staying past the sunrise, for staying as long as both can live in this kingdom and rule it, Will shall pay without question. Will’s breathing turns ragged, just a brief drop in pace before returning to a regular gentle thing, when he feels Hannibal’s palm against him, hot, skin against skin, and he lets his eyes close.

It feels so much better than how Will imagined it. hotter, palms rougher from experience and time. And he bites his lip on a quiet groan as the stroking begins a gentle but firm rhythm. It’s not long before he’s arching into it, legs spreading a little wider around Hannibal, both knees drawn up now as Will forces himself to not yet touch, to rest back and be seen, be enjoyed this way.

Hannibal shifts, when he can hear Will muffling himself, and he pushes down on Will's chest gently , draws him back until his head rests on the mattress and not hung all the way back in such complete submission to what Hannibal intended to do to him. His other hand goes still, though it does not lift, and he eases his thumb over Will's lower lip to soothe it out from between his teeth.

"Give me your voice - no one will hear but me," Hannibal promises, as he settles both his hands at Will's hips instead, to hook his fingers beneath the hem of his pants and begin to ease them off, to lay Will utterly bare to his attention, and the way he arches up into it eager, the way he seeks to push up into every touch. The responsiveness is attractive, addictive. 

When Will lets the lower lip from between his teeth, Hannibal kisses him by way of reward, then draws back, takes Will's pants fully off him as he shifts off the bed and leaves them on the floor, studying the picture sprawled out for his benefit. 

He does not join him, but he reaches, curls his hand around the straining cock skin on skin for the first time, and strokes slow, watching the changes write themselves through the tension in Will's muscles, on his face, in his darkening, barely open eyes.

Will bucks up before he can stop the movement, and the moan this time is loud and needy. The sensation is entirely different to feeling Hannibal against him through fabric, it’s much harder to keep still so Will stops trying to. He arches up, twists his hands in the sheets under him, turns his head back and forth… breathing becoming irregular. It’s dizzying and addicting and finally Will reaches out to Hannibal to see if the man will move closer, will let Will reciprocate with fingers not quite so practiced but meaning well enough.

And he does, sitting up as Hannibal relents just enough to press one knee down on the bed again, between Will’s legs, he reaches to draw his hands over Hannibal’s chest, over the skin he wants to map as carefully as Hannibal had mapped him. he sits closer, legs spread wide but not obscenely as he draws his hands higher, to Hannibal’s neck and into his hair before tugging him gently down, asking for a kiss and getting one.

He’s trembling but not from fear, or nerves. He feels as though he’s vibrating with energy the more he touches Hannibal, and the more he lets Hannibal touch him. and the kiss becomes more frantic, more desperate the closer he gets from the rough palm against him, the methodical, deliberate rhythm that doesn’t speed up but knows just how to twist to get Will’s toes to curl and his voice to leave him. he pulls out of the kiss panting, lips parted and eyes dark, and brings his hands down to fumble with Hannibal’s pants, wanting to give the man just as much pleasure.

“Everything I showed you I wanted to do to you,” he reminds him breathlessly, a gasp hitching his breath for just a moment when Hannibal thumbs the slit gently and sends Will’s eyes rolling gently back on another sweet sound, “What do you want me to do?”

To be honest - this absolute abandonment, this surrender to his own enjoyment is almost enough. It's delicious and addictive, and he can feel the way Will shakes into it, every sensation new. In time this will fade, he knows. In time, William will grow assured and ready for every touch, will know how to take Hannibal apart just as surely. This - is rare. Will meets it without fear, absolutely confident that Hannibal is in it with him.

Hannibal kisses him again, because he appreciates what he has been given. It's power of a different sort, and heady, intoxicating all on its own. Then he settles his hands under Will's back and pulls him up in an arch, and then both of them to sit up, Will over his lap on his knees. 

"Give me what you will freely," Hannibal suggests, against his mouth, looking up at Will for once, and there is so much black in his eyes the blue is only a suggestion. He settles his own knees wide beneath Will's and lets him undo the laces. He feels the arch of back against his hands. They have time, but for once he isn't as concerned with patience. When Will unlaces him but reciprocates through his pants rather than plunging ahead, Hannibal groans, lifts his free hand to curl around the back of Will's head and resumes stroking him - now it is a race, a test. 

Only fair, after what Hannibal has made Will suffer - he does not stop Will from his efforts to make him rush.

For a moment, all they are, are quick breaths and trembling fingers. Will’s lips parted on quick gasps and occasional gentle moans. His fingers aren’t as sure as Hannibal’s, not yet, but they stroke and twist and press as Hannibal’s are and he knows the man beneath him is struggling to maintain the iron composure. It’s a very powerful feeling.

Will sits forward and kisses him, fingers finally insinuating under the fabric and grasping Hannibal properly, and he grins around the sound that vibrates from Hannibal’s lips to his own before pulling back to watch the sensations play out on Hannibal’s face. The hand against him has stilled for the moment, the pressure very much there but the distracting, delicious pull has paused. Will watches Hannibal’s throat work, the way his lips press and curve and part lightly, not quite as innocently responsive as Will is, but certainly present, certainly enjoying himself.

Will gently tilts his hand, presses Hannibal’s cock up against his stomach and lightly teases the underside with the heel of his hand, up and down in an infuriatingly slow rhythm that sets a low groan vibrating from Hannibal’s throat, and a smile growing on Will’s face. He doesn’t relent. Instead, he ducks his head to taste the sweat against Hannibal’s collarbone, up higher to where his pulse beats fast and steady, and Will knows he can make his own match. But then Hannibal’s hand resumes its slow torture and he moans helplessly, for a moment caught between giving pleasure and drowning in it.

“You have my life, Hannibal,” he tells him breathlessly, “And everything that comes with it.”

He swallows down another sound and presses his lips to Hannibal’s harder, parting them with his own as though to dominate but never pushing far enough for it to be complete.

“So what price would you ask,” he whispers, stopping his palm so he’s just rubbing gentle circles over the head, fingers splayed down the length of Hannibal to keep him still, “If I asked you to stay?”

There is a long exhale of breath - he is distracted, deliciously so, and William is asking him far more important questions than he should answer under such duress. He knows better as a sorcerer, but in this case - in this case it's almost safe. Certainly it will never get any safer. 

"If I stay," he begins slowly, taking his hand away from Will's cock for a moment to press his first two fingers into Will's mouth for both the wetness he can pull off the soft, willing tongue and to still his voice for a moment, to be sure he has attention. "You will own me just as thoroughly."

He breaks on a groan at the enthusiastic push of fingers against his own length, at the immediate implied approval, and Hannibal closes his teeth on the inside of his cheek once in sharp purpose. "And for all that I am. I would have your trust... and you must never fear me."

It's an easy price now, but he leaves his fingers where they are until he is certain that William is thinking about it, until he is positive that the King is considering that this life - and it is only the one now - promises to be long and as unpredictable as the first. When he is certain there is not an immediate answer waiting against his fingers, he withdraws them, slowly - strokes one wet line along the man's lower lip, and then curls his hand around his cock again, spreading the slickness of his own spit along him in deliberate, slow strokes.

Will trembles a little, his body sensitive and responsive to Hannibal’s hands, his words. He doesn’t answer immediately, he lets his mind settle – as much as it can – on what Hannibal is asking. He is asking Will to take on his life as Hannibal has taken Will’s, selfishly as it was given. He wants Will to know that there will be times he will want to fear him, where they will disagree, perhaps raise their voices in anger. He wants him to know that, to understand it.

A life is something very special. Something wholly yours.

He shifts a little, just enough to slide off Hannibal’s lap back to the bed and pull the man down with him. he skims his hands over his shoulders, fingers pressing to his back and lower, before sliding his thumbs under the waistband of Hannibal’s pants and easing them off. He lets him go when Hannibal moves back enough to remove them completely, lying back and for a moment just watching the ceiling, watching the way the firelight mingles with the lanterns and dances in slow patters on the stone. When he feels the bed dip, Will turns his eyes back, smile slow and soft on his face.

“Your hands,” he says quietly, “Mine…” his lips curl more, enough just to show the barest line of his teeth before it gentles, “I believe your mouth was next.”

The implication that William had held this thought - had remembered enough to plan and consider, before everything had changed for the worse (and then ultimately, for the better when they had overcome), is deeply alluring. It brings a cool sweat down Hannibal's spine, his own excitement - a rare feeling, an old one that he has not recently renewed acquaintance with.

Hannibal sinks to his knees, pulls William toward the edge of the bed by his hips. If he is grateful for the fact that it puts him out of Will's reach to continue the assault on his own willpower, and he starts with his tongue extended, in short licks over the head of Will's cock, tasting, exploring, pleasing himself as much as the other when Will's voice tears free as he presses his tongue into the slit, and then stops instantly. Hannibal exhales warm air over wet skin, and gives William something to consider, to distract.

"Did what you imagine change?" he asks, drawing back and looking up, his fingers stroking the inside of Will's thighs distractingly. "After the taste I left you with?"

Hannibal doesn't make him answer without the distraction and excuse for his voice - he parts his teeth and takes Will's length into his mouth, inch by distracting inch, to see if Will can find enough of his voice and thoughts to answer in anything but encouraging sounds.

It’s a feeling Will had never been able to properly imagine. He had simulated it with a wet palm, hot fingers, pressure and a gentle stroke of his thumb counter to the rhythm of his hand but it is nothing – nothing – compared to this. He finds himself covering his eyes, breathing back to the quick uncontrollable beat of before as he tries so hard to get his tongue to work again.

“Oh, this is better…” he moans quietly, voice shaky but undoubtedly honest. For a while, he just lets himself enjoy it, toes curling in pleasure, hands alternating between gripping the bed and himself – his hair, thumbing his nipples, stroking his throat – and feels himself come closer and closer. It’s too soon, far too soon, but he’s certain Hannibal will remember he also wanted to keep Will on the edge until he was begging, whimpering for things he didn’t understand.

“So much better…” Will wonders if he should attempt to return the favor, knowing his tongue would not be as clever, nor his endurance quite so high, but the idea of bringing Hannibal this much pleasure, this much ache, is just so tempting.

And he had told the man he would get on his knees.

“Nnn Hannibal –“ Will arches, knees drawing up a little higher and thighs spreading in a wanton, needy display. He can feel the man smile around him, choosing not to relent, and he supposes it’s only fair that after two weeks of enduring nothing but the barest hint of touch, the softest brush of hands, that Hannibal takes what he wants from him, as much of it as Will is able to give him.

“Did yours?” he manages breathlessly.

The honesty and openness are sweet and seductive all on their own, the absolute truth Will gives him, even as his body opens and lays spread under his attention. He slides his hands up the back of Will's thighs and feels the muscles tremble, before he backs off, licking his lips, pushing his tongue against the roof of his mouth to dilute the bitterness some on his tongue.

"Some," he agrees, "I couldn't have imagined your enthusiasm until I experienced it." 

He glances up along the length of Will's body, smiling again, faintly wicked. He does not immediately resume what he was doing, instead curling his hand firmly around the base of Will's dick and pushing it up, toward his belly so that his mouth can work beneath it, from the base of Will's shaft down, working wide and wet over his balls, and then down further - he has not forgotten his promise to get Will to lose his voice entirely to begging, nor had he played every card on the table in his suggestions.

He pushes his thumb hard against the base of Will's cock as he presses his tongue in long stripes against him, then a faster, shorter rhythm, keeping track of the pulse, pushing down on the dorsal vein to be wary for any sign that Will was about to go over - and then he stops, when he feels Will right on the point of release, making a pleased sound, waiting for the protest. Will's body twists beneath his hands pleasingly, body begging before he finds any words.

The sensation is so overwhelming that Will’s voice leaves him loud and sudden, muscles stilling in pleasure as he tries to catch his breath. Hannibal doesn’t let him. And Will thinks again on his threats to drive him to the point of pleasure where words aren’t words, and where he will beg for anything as long as Hannibal hears him. right then, he doesn’t even have words.

One hand instinctively goes to Hannibal’s hair, fingers curling the strands tightly before letting go as his body gets used to the sensations enough to know it wants more, and deeper still. He starts a rhythm of his own, gentle undulations against Hannibal’s clever tongue and patient hands that are methodically working him to breathless mewls and other pathetic noises.

“Han –“ Will stills again, back arched and lips parted on first a wail and then nothing at all but rapid breathing. “Hannibal… please… please…”

He remembers well the threat to do nothing more than touch him, stretch and tease him, and wants to cry with the frustration. The delicious sensation returns, with Hannibal having decided Will had enough time to breathe before returning to his slow, effective torment. He wonders if his voice is truly just for Hannibal or if the castle is echoing with his pleas.

This time, the begging gets Will somewhere - Hannibal does not have to resist his pleas, so he doesn't, sliding one hand off of William's knee and down to seek through the pocket of his shirt on the floor and come up with a small brown glass bottle. He pauses only to look down at what he's doing, to spread slickness thick on his fingers before he sets the bottle aside where it's unlikely to get kicked or tipped.

Then he eases back onto the bed, moves Will up it again to lean him back onto the pillows, and reaches down, sliding his fingers against him where his mouth had been, and finding him more relaxed than he might have been without the prior attention of Hannibal's mouth, and he pushes shallowly with two fingers, taking it slow and teasing both, as he leans over Will, pulls their bodies together so he can see and feel every change.

Hannibal pushes his mouth against Will's neck, gently, and then leans back - just enough to watch him, to pay attention for any sign of discomfort as he works and stretches - very slowly, patiently, before Will gets his hands on Hannibal's cock again to drive him faster through reciprocation, and it's distracting, a sudden heat that pools low in his back. "How do you want to finish, Will?" He asks, breathless. They had never negotiated that.

Will just ducks his head enough to kiss Hannibal again, the only answer he can give him. right then he doesn’t care, he knows that no matter how it finishes, it will be for mutual pleasure, not dominance or submission, not to prove a point. He swallows a breath and gently pushes his hips down to meet Hannibal’s fingers, slow and gentle as his previous undulations had been, but now meeting a deeper pressure.

His hand stays deliberately out of time with the way Hannibal’s moves, keeping his mind preoccupied, distracted enough not to forget that Will has just as much control as he does, though his way of showing it isn’t quite as controlled.

“Will it really just finish?” he asks, offering a smirk before Hannibal touches some part of him that makes Will drop his free hand behind his head to cling to something, anything he can reach. When he blinks the stars from behind his eyelids, he gently runs his nail just under the head of Hannibal’s cock, deliberate and slow, and tightens his muscles before Hannibal can do it to him again.

Hannibal starts to respond, then his words turn into a gasp instead and a hiss of pleasure before he has to bite his lip, successfully stymied from repeating the motion by Will's body growing tight around his fingers. He scissors them within him softly, coaxing, and tries to find breath again. "Are you suggesting that if I left now," he says,a nd pulls in air again, "suggesting that ou wait again, I wouldn't wake tied to my own bed - that you'd give me another chance?"

Will doubts that will be all. With the creativity Hannibal has shown so far, the things he can do to Will that would just involve the use of his hands and mouth could have him sobbing into the pillow by morning, and sleeping like the dead till the mid afternoon when he is to be crowned. The thought suddenly very much amuses Will and he laughs, a low, genuine sound. He eases his stroking to a barely there touch, a teasing thing, and nuzzles Hannibal’s face up gently to press their lips together. However it finishes – when it does – he’ll be limping to his throne.

He isn’t aware he’s said the words aloud until a similar laugh vibrates through Hannibal’s chest.

"I wouldn't be so rough," he assures, "Unless that seems appealing." Hannibal hooks his fingers again, but just barely this time, a long slow stroke so the sensation crawls slowly up Will's spine instead of jolting over him. Hannibal watches the pleasure run through Will's eyes, feels him sigh it out, and makes a decision that perhaps he can allow more than what he promised - in time.

He draws his fingers back slowly, and pushes with a third, helps Will feel the stretch, reaching back with his free hand after a brief reassurance that he wasn't going far, just recovering the bottle from where he'd left it, and then after a moment of brief debate, he simply pours it over Will's fingers without asking him to remove them from his own length, letting him get the idea of where it's going. 

The movement becomes slicker, easier, and Will pushes himself up to look at Hannibal properly as he works him up, closer. Perhaps it's the teasing or how long they've had to wait, or perhaps Will has earned the right to see Hannibal this way, but it is a sight to behold. Eyes hooded and near-closed, lips parted just enough to breathe, to entice Will to lean closer and brush his own against them.

He remembers how he had asked to have Hannibal his, on his birthday, and how the man had responded. The quiet longing there. And now, Will had asked again, had been offered what he wanted and asked to consider. He would not do the man the disservice of not, regardless of having made up his mind. Gaining his life did not change him wanting to give it to Hannibal. 

For a brief moment the stretch gets wider and Will gasps, back arching gently. His fingers lose their rhythm and it seems and unspoken cue. Will lets him go, offering a small smile, and shifts to lie back. He stretches, a delicious full body thing, before lying against the bed pliant, comfortable, and bringing his still-slick hand down to stroke himself as he waits.

Hannibal follows, leaning up to kiss Will again, after the sinuous stretch has run its course with his body. Will settles back in easy, relaxed lines and Hannibal smoothes his hands over him briefly before he turns Will over onto his belly instead.

Will stays easy and malleable when Hannibal shifts his knees to make things easier - when he reaches up and gets one of the big pillows at the top of the bed to slide beneath Will for something to rest on and grip to, and to help elevate his hips, before he settles over Will's back and mouths gently at the base of his neck. Face down will make this a little easier the first time, and give him something to hold and cling to.

Hannibal stretches him with his fingers again, and finds Will welcoming it, twisting his body into it, forcing Hannibal to follow the motions of his hips as Will tries to push his fingers into what he knows is coming again. The silent demand makes Hannibal smile, spreading his fingers one last time before he withdraws them entirely, and he positions himself, leans low over Will's back and holds himself steady as he begins to push in - his other hand curled into the blankets by Will's shoulder.

It's more than he promised, but then again - Will was consistently more than he expected. He presses, and turns his open mouth gently against Will's ear so he can hear the soft sounds under Hannibal's breath as he pushes, and then stops, waits for Will to get used to the new sensation.

It’s not so much a pain as a constant steady pressure, and Will finds his eyes closing on reflex. He arches up into it, adjusting as Hannibal is until they’re both still, Will panting quiet moans into the pillow under him. He tilts his head, arching his neck where he feels Hannibal’s lips. He doesn’t move yet, the pressure still enough to make him gently wince if he shifts his hips back on a breath.

It’s surprisingly comfortable, warm, and Will closes his eyes before starting to gently move. It’s a slow rhythm, but one that Will controls before it gets difficult to keep from making a sound.

“Move, move, please move…” he breathes, curling his hands in the sheets, and turning his head with a smile. His eyes are half closed, lips parted, and when Hannibal obliges him he keens. It’s slow and hot, and Will finds himself arching back into it every time Hannibal moves, wanting to make it just as enjoyable for Hannibal as this is for him. he presses the heels of his palms against the bed, shoulders rolling and groans in pleasure.

“Let me up,” he begs, smiling when he feels Hannibal mouth against his neck and down the skin of his shoulders. But then he moves, lets him, and Will adjusts himself on all fours, the change of angle making his head duck down between his shoulders and his lips part wide on a silent cry. Yes. Certainly a choice he’s happy with.

The premonition Hannibal had all those days ago in the book tower seemed to have been a wise one - he knows now that when Will asks, he will very likely be unable to say no - even to much delay saying yes. For at least as long as he is earnest, he will be fascinating, compelling. It's impossible to deny him what he wants - will only get harder as Hannibal knows he will try his hardest to be sure Hannibal is enjoying himself just as much.

Hannibal soothes his hands over Will's back, takes control of the pace to keep it slow and deep until he's sure the slide is easy and it won't hurt Will, and then longer still just to hear Will raise his voice in pleased sounds that border on impatient.

Rather than speed up, he slides a hand beneath Will instead, and curls his hand around Will's cock to stroke him slow and long, in counterpoint to his own motions, but without any extreme hurry - he's building anyway, feeling the first warnings of release even from this slow, deep and measured pace. 

"So impatient," he purrs to Will, "I suppose I deserve that." He teases the rough pad of his thumb against the slit in the head of Will's cock, slick with the last of the oil from Will's fingers and his own precum, and then he rushes them both, repeating the motion as his thrusts grow shallower and more rapid.

Perhaps, selfishly, Will feels that he deserves it. he knows it is all in jest, knows that Hannibal’s chastising is as much a game as their games were, but feeling how the man touches him, how he deliberately makes sure Will feels every single gentle brush of fingers, feels how deep Hannibal goes when he presses in again and again… it makes Will come very, very close to incoherent begging. He wants this. Needs it. and spreads his legs just enough in invitation to ask for it properly.

Predictably, Will breaks first, voice loud and guttural as his fingers slip a little in their grip of the sheets. He feels boneless, more so than he ever has, and he also feels a swelling of pride knowing he has brought a pleased laugh from Hannibal, more caresses, silent encouragement. He doesn’t stop moving, doesn’t stop trying to wring as much enjoyment out of Hannibal as the man has out of him. he supposes after this they will both lie hot and sated, tangled together until Will recovers enough to crawl over the man like a puppy for attention.

In the meantime, he clenches his muscles again, feel his breath stutter at the sensation before arching his back gently and turning just enough to watch Hannibal over his shoulder.

It’s only when the man comes, draws his lips just under the damp curls against Will’s back, and pulls out of him, that Will realizes that he will still walk strangely. Even with the promise – and fulfilment – of gentleness on Hannibal’s part. He sighs out, a long, pleased noise, and sinks into the sheets. He turns fluidly, eyes sleepy and smile more so, and gently reaches out to slide his fingers down Hannibal’s shoulder, curving them enough to suggest he wants the man closer.

Hannibal settles down into the blankets, then briefly flings his awareness out to be sure his magic had remained in place while his concentration had been so deliciously torn, and finds it intact. And also becomes aware of the warm weight of Will at his shoulder. He reaches out, curls both his arms around William and pulls him close, settling back to let them both catch their breath as they lean together, as they had those weeks ago.

Pressing their mouths together again, Hannibal supposes he must get used to the feeling of no longer wholly belonging to himself. He does not need to reassure himself by asking if the wait was worth the result - it is written clearly on the blissed out expression on Will's face, by the way he tries to push every inch of himself against Hannibal in his boneless, relaxed afterglow.

Sighing, Hannibal runs his fingers through Will's damp hair with an almost resigned affection, and he waits - waits for further questions, or his answer, or for Will to decide he wasn't remotely finished and try to coax more response out of Hannibal. "Wholly worth the magic," Hannibal decides at last, "to hear you come apart."

Will doesn’t dignify that with a verbal response, though his cheeks do color. He nuzzles in under Hannibal’s chin and just rests, fingers mirroring the same patterns Hannibal is gently working into his scalp against the man’s chest. After a while, when their hearts have slowed and their breathing turned even, Will slides over the man to lie above him.

Hannibal looks younger when he’s relaxed, smile coming easier, and eyes a softer brown. Will supposes, as his smile widens at the thought, that he can get used to this. He chews the inside of his lip a moment, just letting the comfortable silence stretch, feels the way Hannibal runs his hands from his thighs and up his spine.

“Please stay.” He asks finally, tone quiet, expression of one who knows the answer to the request but still hesitates with the possibility of a rejection. He can’t make Hannibal stay. He refuses to make Hannibal do anything. He has him, by promise and desire, until the sun climbs over the horizon and renders the lanterns void. But after that…

Hannibal does smile then, genuinely, and it touches deeper into his eyes than it might have otherwise. William's own are blue and earnest, almost desperate to hear the affirmation. Hannibal measures him, measures his own response. Under the pressure of that expectant gaze, he finds even his substantial willpower wavering dangerously. 

"It's very dangerous for me to surrender myself to someone I cannot resist," Hannibal begins, still stroking his fingers through Will's hair in gentle soothing motions. "But I will. Do not ask anything of me you don't carefully consider, William - I am unlikely to ever refuse you."

For now, while the man was young, Hannibal doubts that will be difficult - but as men grew older, found themselves with enemies and betrayals and difficulties... Hannibal was a creature with a tempting amount of power - now even more than before. The rest... well they would see. Hannibal will worry about it at a point when it may become an issue. Hannibal yawns, and finally allows a real answer.

"I will stay as long as you'll have me, Will," he promises. "And I hope that is a very long time."

Will’s grin widens before he notices the serious tone, the way Hannibal watches him to make sure he understands before clearing his expression and setting it away. Will understands. He hopes he never has to ask him.

“Then I will have you as long as you stay.” He tells him, leaning in to kiss him, a promise for a promise. He feels how lax Hannibal’s muscles have gone beneath him, how tired he is. And after their ordeals today, Will doesn’t blame him. he’s exhausted, would go as far as to say drained if only he didn’t feel so full of life; his own and the one that was offered him. when he pulls back, his eyes are closed and he’s smiling.

“I suppose you want me to let you rest.” He murmurs, perfectly content with sleeping until his coronation if that is what they end up doing, but he can’t resist teasing him.

Hannibal touches his closed eyelids with gentle fingers, strokes his hands gently over the man's cheeks, down under his chin. He touches whatever is exposed to him, and finds that much of it is - intentional or not, William is open and easy for him, and Hannibal hopes that none of it will change, though he knows he can't offer quite that much of himself in return.

"All that patience," Hannibal prompts, teasing gently in return, much relieved - Will took it seriously enough, without becoming so serious he could not enjoy the exchange they had made - as one should. It should be an occasion for joy. "And you want to sleep so soon?"

He chuckles, rolls his hips up once in a suggestive stretch, and then settles back, comfortable. "Well then, sleep well."

Will ducks his head to rest on Hannibal’s chest and opens just one eye to see him. He notes the smile, the way he can’t resist closing his eyes in show… it’s fun, and warm and everything Will supposes love should be. It makes him smile a bit wider. Knowing that he has a time enough. Knowing that come what may they will still have this to return to, still have the tower of books like a room full of puppies vying for their attention. He licks his lips lightly and presses them against Hannibal’s chest in a deliberate, soft motion.

“I think I shall,” he whispers, sending Hannibal a blinding grin when the other looks surprised to have his bluff so called. And Will closes his eyes, as deliberate and showy as Hannibal’s game had started.

After all, they have a lifetime.


End file.
